Crafting...Pom Pom Project

Pom poms. Two doughnuts of cardboard and a remnant of wool=cute and fluffy with ease. We all learnt to make them when we were small, so they have great nostalgia value. A hat wasn't a hat without a pom pom (remember The Flumps?), nor for that matter was a pair of ankle socks, and was there anybody alive in the 80's who didn't have a souvenir gonk stuck to their pencil case/desk/school bag?
Once again inspired by some long forgotten blogpost, and in my infant-school school of craft style I've combined the two top (in my day anyway!) kiddie-crafts-with-wool, pom poms and french knitting, to make pom pom bunting to decorate the nurseries of two soon to be born babies...

                                             Easy, fluffy and cute, especially when made with mohair.

Erm, well not so easy actually.

Typically, despite the lower order craftiness required, I had difficulty with both the pom poms and the french knitting. Sigh!  My initial pom poms were too big, and to get them small enough to look right proportionally with the french knitted string demanded digital dexterity I just don't posses in my fat fingers. And I developed a severe patch of sore dermatitis on my finger from incessant wool winding (there are 40 pom poms on each one fyi!). The mother-in-law (craft guru) came to the rescue with the suggestion I buy a pom pom maker (a what?) which solved both problems easily.

Brilliant, easy, quick, get one.

Then there was the french knitting. Or rather the french knitter. I bought one of these mass produced in china for kids french knitters. So far, so pretty.

But the wretched thing had a rough, splintered inner which meant it took me about 10 frustrating minutes even to get the wool from top to bottom to begin to cast on, and when I started to knit proper it snagged the wool horribly. Arghh! Totally unfit for purpose.

(the ones with what look like staples on the top are totally useless too, the wool just slips off constantly, infuriatingly, ask the 81 year old struggling with it at my library craft circle, bless her!)

So anyway I turned blue peter and went back to ye olde worlde way of french knitting, a wooden cotton reel with four small nails knocked in.

Looks beautiful, works beautifully.

(The nails are 16 x 20 mm, flat head diamond point with a plain shank. Go impress your local hardware merchant with that request, heh!)

If you want to know how to cast on, knit, and cast off it's easy to follow here

I trialled two ways of arranging the pom poms

And I like both.

The only issue remaining is how to package them so the look pwetty but don't tangle...ideas anyone?