10 Busy Bags To Keep Kids Busy

I have been using busy bags to keep my children occupied since they were babies, they are 10 and 12 now. I still think busy bags would work at restaurants when they get fed up waiting for food or fed up looking at each other. Especially since phones are now a common dinner table activity it is very hard to stop them from touching their devices when every family around us is on them. I think busy bags with table top games would work wonders for those children who are not able to just sit and “people watch”.

But these busy bags are the perfect idea for younger children. I love the bags Powerfulmothering has used as they are easy to see in and quick to grab. If you are looking for busy bags for younger kids then you need to visit her blog and check them all out in this detailed article. You could easily pop these bags together in an hour or less and it will literally give you hours of grab and go activities when you are out and about, travelling or unable to muster the energy to parent.

I guess I’m on a bit of a double knitting tear these days. Just the other day I shared some double knitting potholder patterns, and if you’re ready for a more complex double knitting pattern, I would love to recommend this one to you.

The Puppet Master Scarf from Katharina Kuntz is a long double knit scarf with a variety of Muppet characters on it. I see Kermit and Ms. Piggy, of course, as well as Fozzie Bear, Gonzo, Beaker, Rowlf the Dog, Rizzo the Rat and Sam Eagle to name a few. The scarf is densely packed with characters who are different colors on each side.

They’re also potentially different colors from each other, which is shown in the sample here. There are charts in the pattern that show you how to work the whole scarf in two colors or use multiple colors for the different characters.

As shown the scarf uses 20 colors of fingering weight yarn. You’ll need about 656 yards/600 meters of each if you use two colors, and a range for the different characters if you do them all in different colors, but only a couple of them take more than 50 yards. You could definitely use leftovers from other projects on this one.

The finished scarf is about 6.4 inches/16.3 cm wide and 72.4 inches or 184 cm long.

It would definitely be a labor of love but this looks like such a fun project and I’m sure you would get a lot of attention from knitters and non-knitters alike when you wear it!

While this project looks a lot more complicated than those pot holders I just shared, the skills are the same. You just really need to pay attention to the charts to make sure you’re making your characters look how they are supposed to. There are also photos and links to video tutorials to help you along the way.

You can grab a copy of the pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: Katharina Kuntz]

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