Stuffed Animal Hammock-knit

I was looking for something to put all of Eli's stuffed animals in, since he has a ton of them and they seem to take over his crib.  I liked the idea of the animal hammocks, but didn't want to buy one.  I had some extra white yarn sitting around so I decided to get to work and make a pattern for one. So here it goes. This was his other b-day present-practical yes, but he needed it and I wanted an excuse to make it besides just because!

white yarn
Size 13 circle needles

CO2
Knit row
Increase in each st
Knit row
Increase in each st
Knit row
Increase in 1st and last st, knit all sts between
Knit row
Increase in 1st, 5th, and last st, knit all sts between
Knit row
Repeat the above two rows(instead of the 5th st always inc in the middle st of the row) until you have 80sts on needles.
Knit 20 rows
Now you are going to decrease in the same pattern, so it looks even so your decrease row should be:
k2 tog in 1st 2sts, middle 2sts, and last 2sts, knit all sts in between.
Knit row
Continue this until you have 10 sts left on your needles then do as follows:
K2 tog in 1st 2sts, knit and k2tog for last 2 sts
knit row
k2 tog for row
knit row
k2 tog for row
knit row
k2 tog
bind off stitches and leave a long tail so you can tie it all together and you will be able to hang it.

I finally decided to hang this in his closet, low enough so he could get to it, but so they were not just thrown in a pile in the closet!

Storage Boxes

I was needing something to put all of Eli's toys in since they seem to have taken over the living room.

So I pulled out an old diaper box (I was trying to think of something creative to do with them), and got to work.  I cut off the top pieces so that it would stay open.

I then spray painted 3 of the sides blue.

Then because of my new found love with chalkboard paint, I painted the front of the box with that!  Yeah, now I can write toys on it. 

I'm so very excited to have somewhere to put all his toys instead of just scattered all across the floor! Greg is too, as the clutter I think gets on his nerves more than mine. Below is what the room looked like before!

It sits so nicely on the bookshelf and now it is a bookshelf of everything Eli instead of just some random stuff!

Much better don't you think??
Now I just need to find my chalk so I can write on the box.  You have to wait for 24 hrs before you can write on the surface, so maybe tomorrow I will try and find the chalk!