Waldorf school toy and craft fair 2011

The local Rudolph Steiner/Waldorf school Raphael House had their annual food, toy and craft festival this past weekend and for the second year in a row I had a stall. It’s really a perfect fit – all my felt toys and Waldorf patterns after all. Last year I did really well. This year I did really well and had very little stuff left. As usual it was funny the things that were in demand – it’s never what I think is the cutest.

The Christmas room. It smelt amazing and I love having my stall right outside it:

The parent craft room – I had to take a photo of it before it filled up. It is always filled to capacity with people by the time I get to it during the fair:

The blackboard in Class 1:

Fuschia ornaments – sadly long gone by the time I went back to buy one. Ironically I have a fuschia bush outside my front door that I am waging war on. It grows back practically overnight. Yet craft it’s flowers out of beautiful felt and I’ll happily pay money for them! Crazy woman!

My rather restrained purchases:

Sadly the wooden toys I waited all year to buy more of from the parent craft room hadn’t arrived for the fair so I settled for some handspun merino and handmade toadstool needles. They were parent made but one parent did tell me that the Year 3 kids make knitting needles to gift to the Year 1 kids who will be learning to knit that year. So the needles have a special meaning to me. Plus they are just bloody cute. The lamb and toadstool are just because I have no restraint when I have money in my hand.

Rainbow horsie the second

Because rainbow horsies breed prodigiously. Did you know that? It’s true. When you can sew and have a love of rainbows rivaling that of an 8 year old girl they do anyway.

Rainbow horsie

A year ago at the local Waldorf school fair I had a stall and I ran into the lovely lady who bought my very first hobby horse about 18 months earlier and asked her if it had survived. Cos you know – handstitching, PVA glue and a toddler….but she said that it was still around and was ridden every day and called Rainbow Horsie. Awwwww. That is why I make toys, you know? The aww factor is my biggest reward. I have no plans to make any more hobby horses but this little softie is in honour of Rainbow Horsie and it’s little rider and it will be for sale at this years Waldorf school fair next month.

Knitted Bunny

After seeing Hanna and Melissa‘s sweet bunnies I just had to make one. It was the perfect pick up and put down project – it’s just an 8 inch square. I’d fire off a row or two whenever the lazyboy was free (which is basically….never thanks to the cat) and I’d just rock and knit for a few minutes. Call me a nana but it was bliss. The pattern is from the Waldorf book Creative Play for your Baby (or Toddler, I forget which one) but there is a similar free pattern here which has great instructions.

Waldorf school festival

Two years ago I spotted a poster in the library advertising the local Waldorf school’s annual craft, food and toy festival. It was a fabulous event, there were a ton of people and their cash machine was broken so I was stuck with the $6 I had in my pocket. The stalls of wooden toys, organic chocolate, Waldorf dolls and other things for sale had me in cashless agony. Last year I had no money in the bank or otherwise so we skipped it but this year on a whim I decided to try for a stall and got the very last one. It was obviously meant to be. My stall was in the foyer outside class two which is the Christmas Room. Here’s a few photos and words about the day:

Class Two decked out in amazing style as the Christmas Room. No kids allowed until the fair is open:

The decorations along the back wall:

The chalkboard. I wish all schools still used chalkboards. And I wish I could make art like that:

The detail they went to is amazing. And so is the view:

I don’t know what this room is normally but it’s the cutest little cottage style building and I love the fence:

A couple of the rooms had raffles. The Christmas Room had the most amazing raffle. I mean AMAZING. Third prize is a cake which didn’t interest me. First and second prize however…damn! Second prize was a needlefelted nativity set:

It was beautifully soft and squishy and I could easily imagine pulling it out and setting it up with a child each year in the future. Sadly I didn’t win it. And most annoyingly I didn’t win first prize – the most beautiful dollhouse I have ever seen in person:

Apparently a parent made it and donated it for the festival. He is a doctor and doesn’t even bother making them for sale but I’m seriously tempted to try track him down and ask how much he would charge for one!

My stall was the most successful I have had in ages. I got tons of feedback, ideas and I earned enough to pay the bills that the enormous vet bill put us behind on (that was paid off last week, yay!), buy a couple of craft books and best of all finally buy some wooden toys:

I can’t wait for next years festival!

Waldorf fair

You ever have those days where one simple blog entry takes hours to write? This is one of those entries:

Sometimes I feel a little weird having such an interest in Waldorf education without actually having children but I do have a background in early childhood education.

Dave diligently drove me out there and we fought the crowds and climbed a gazillion stairs but it was so worth it. I drooled over the wooden toys, Waldorf dolls, knights costumes and sheilds/swords and dragged Dave from pillar to post. But he actually said he was really impressed and that it would be cool to go to school there. The classrooms were swathed in pastel coloured fabrics and all had something different going on in each one, it was like entering a new world through each door. Because the kindy is much lower than the rest of the school it was sadly closed for the fair but the kindergarten yard was a little paradise:

(click on the picture for a bigger view, it’s so worth it)