"Oh I Do Like To Be Beside The Seaside"

My recent family trip to the seaside, closely followed by a school trip to the Sea Life Centre in Brighton, put in mind that I should branch out a little from the insects and try my hand at some sea creatures, or maybe I should say beach creatures.

The knitting patterns for these sea creatures are available on Ravelry. 

I have a special offer running on Ravelry, where you can buy any two of my seaside patterns, including my popular spiral shell, and get a £1 discount. I also have a few of my seaside sets for sale for non-knitters in my Etsy Shop.

I have a few more sea creatures in the pipeline, which I am still working on.

I have tried to photograph them below so that you have to look quite hard I hope to see which are knitted and which are real. 

I have been working on the patterns for a while, and am pleased with the way they have turned out. The scallop shell can be knitted as one half, or as two and sewn together and stuffed. I thought it might be nice to make into a lavendar bag. 

Hubby suggested fashioning two shells into a bikini, but soon told him what to do with that idea. Scallops seem to come in a huge variety of colours and patterns, as you can see from the black shell that we found on a beach in Cornwall. So anyone who knits one could really let their imagination go wild.

This version of the starfish has a bit of embroidery, but this is optional. As usual I have tried to go for realism. I have put a page on my blog on how to sew a french knot, as I love using this stitch. I seem to use it a lot, and people think it is difficult, so hope I have shown how simple it is.

This is the underside, which my son says is where a starfish's mouth is?

I have a few more sea creatures in the pipeline, which I am still working on.