anyone for fishing?

What some of you may or may not know is that my husband is a full-time at home dad and I am the 'bread winner'. It's an interesting scenario to find myself in.  I was an at home mum for my eldest two and also had a stint at being a single mum for a while too so I find it fascinating to be on the other side.  Unlike some 'bread winners' I know what it's like to talk infant all day, be in a continuous state of exhaustion and die for the moment when another adult walks in the door, but I must admit I am beginning to digress!  I'll save all this for another post.

During the week Dad was having one of those days when the age of three reveals itself as far worse than two (why does everyone think two is so bad?).  With his sanity rapidly being sucked out by our daughter he knew he had to came up with something to make his day easier.  So what did he do?  He made her a fishing game, the kind that uses magnets.

I was so chuffed when I came home from work and saw what he had done.  He is such a clever little bee.  He made her a fishing rod out of a bit of pole, tape, string and a magnet and drew up some fish and an octupus onto some cardboard.  After cutting them out the two of them sat down together and coloured them in.  He then stapled each one a few times to give the magnet something to stick to and grabbed a bucket to put them in.  It was brilliant and Ivy absolutely loved it.

The only problem with the game was that the cardboard he had used was a little thin and undoubtedly wouldn't last forever and this got me thinking.

In steps mum...


Yep, I couldn't help myself.  Today I sat down with my felt stash and proceeded to churn out sea-life for Ivy.

Meet the fish...


I started out with the intention of hand-sewing all the creatures with a blanket stitch edge but I was in a slightly "can't be bothered" mood so I moved onto using the sewing machine for the final two fish.  On reflection I should have hand-sewed the whole lot.  Not only does the hand-sewing look better and make the felt sit better it's also easier sewing in the washers (metal for the magnets) on the inside seam which the sewing machine can't accommodate.  It may have sewn the seams quicker but it threw up it's own problems; changing cottons, placement and sewing in of washers etc... and in the end took about the same amount of time as hand sewing.

I then started on the rest of the gang, meet starfish, jelly fish and blob of seaweed...


Ivy was particularly amused by the blob of seaweed.  It's always hilarious catching something horrible, stinky and undesirable isn't it?  The seawead was easy to make, just some scrap wool and green ric-rac I had lying around.  The jelly fish was really easy too.  A bit of felt and some ribbon for it's tentacles.

It was all quite fun to make but I wish in some ways I had been in the mood to take my time.  It would have been great putting more effort into the decorating of the fish.  I would have loved to have sewn on scales, sequins, stripes and made them look absolutely exquisite but I just wasn't up for it today.   I wanted to finish it as quickly as I could and my desired aesthetic would mean the project may drag on for weeks.  I guess I could always attempt it later, one fish at a time...hmmm, yep it's the thought that counts!!

If any of you would like a tutorial on how to make a set like this I am happy to try and muster one up.  It's a great little game to make for little ones and would be a great gift idea too.  The beauty of it all is that you could probably find every thing you need from around the home and if you can't,  then none of the materials cost that much anyway.  Let me know, I'm happy to share the love.
=D