Love...

I keep alluding to these "wins" I've had... finally I'm going to show you one of them!


I received this a week ago, but was waiting until the weekend to take a picture so I could have a vague bit of light for the photo!  During the week it's dark before I leave work, so difficult to take photos in the evenings.  So on Saturday I got snapping...


I entered a giveaway on Mary Poppins' lovely blog, and I can't believe I won!!  It was such an amazing giveaway - a Jan Constantine 'LOVE' cushion from John Lewis!

Isn't it lovely?!  It is really heavy too - no Wilkinsons cushion pad in this baby! - you can really feel the quality!  Even the back is gorgeous... I have to keep turning it over to look at it...

As I said to Mary, I am hoping this cushion will bring some love into my home and life!!  Those of you who have been reading my blog for a while will know that I broke up with my boyfriend, and he moved out, six months ago.  So it is definitely time for things to turn around in the love department - I have decided that this cushion is a good luck love charm!  (Fingers crossed!  I need all the luck I can get!!)  :o)


Thank you so much Mary - I honestly can't believe I won such an amazing giveaway!!  I really appreciate it!


Oh, and it came with a lovely card - which I am going to frame and put up in the kitchen because it's so pretty!

Thanks again Mary!


In other news, I whipped up some cupcakes yesterday!

Before you start thinking I'm really talented - I didn't make the toppers!!  I made the cupcakes, and iced them (rather haphazardly - I mean, look at the one in the bottom left corner - what happened there?!  As you can tell, cake decorating is not my forte - I'm more of a cake eater!!) but the toppers were from a giveaway I won back in July, from Sue at The Krafty Cupcake.  As you can tell, cake decorating definitely IS her forte!  You can see the post showing my winnings here.  That was an extremely generous giveaway!


I especially like these two...

Thanks again Sue for these toppers (and everything else!)


I also won another giveaway a couple of weeks ago - but it is a kit, and I want to make it up before I do the post for it... which is why I've been delaying telling you about it!  Wow, it seems like a win a lot of things!!!  I'm not usually lucky like that at all - most strange!


I also need to post about my blog award, but I've gone on long enough in this post - so next time!  I've got the day off today, yay! - although I woke up at 7am which is very annoying!!  I'm off to see my lovely friend Anna later, which I'm looking forward to!  I'm going to bring some of my cupcakes for us to partake in!


Until next time...

Ta Dah and Ta Dah!

No... it's not the baby blanket ta dah - although I have finished it - yay!  I love it!  I'm gazing adoringly over at it now...aaahhhh.  Just haven't taken photos yet... and won't do the ta dah post until after I've given it to my brother and sister-in-law.  So you'll have to wait!!  :o)


To keep you going, here are pictures of a felt stars hanging decoration I made for my sister-in-law as one of the presents I gave for her baby shower.  It is to hang in the nursery...

Poor light as usual... so excuse the dingy photos...

I don't know how many pictures you need to see of three felt stars - but there you go!!  Overkill!!!  :o)


I have also quickly whipped up a little tealight jar jacket thingymabob!  And this actually was a quick easy project that turned out to be quick and easy - phew!  I'd seen them on Coco Rose Diaries and Bunny Mummy blogs... and got the pattern from Nature Nut Notes.

I made it with an 8mm hook, to try to make it a bit looser and more holey, to let the light through...

I absolutely love it - it looks so pretty lit up!!  

Wow - loads of photos today!!!


I've still got to tell you about a couple of wins, and about a blog award (thank you Rhi!!!)  I will do that next time!


Bye for now...

Crochet Squares...

Thanks for the lovely positive comments on the baby blanket!  I've not made much progress since I posted that - it's been a busy week!  However, earlier in the week I did get around to taking some more pictures...

Piles of squares...

I like seeing them stacked in piles!

And here they are laid out...

We actually have the baby shower for my sister-in-law today, so that should be good fun!

I've got more to share on a couple of wins (!!!) and another make!!  But you'll have to wait for that, as I've got to rush now!

Have a lovely weekend everyone!  :o)

Baby Blanket Update

Hi all - thanks for the lovely comments on my flower keyring!  Also for the comments on the cup-cosy post.  I meant to mention at the time that I got the idea from Annaboo's House, here.  I hadn't seen cup-cosies until then, and I love them!  Hers are much more snuggly looking than mine - not to mention neater!  I think I've seen a cup-cosy on another blog too somewhere, but can't remember which one...

I've been working hard on the baby blanket for my nephew - he's due next month, so I thought I'd better get a move on!  Here is how it's looking so far:

Last time I showed it I was just doing the three colours - mid blue, baby blue and yellow, but now I've added a turquoise colour, just to hopefully make it a bit funkier and more modern maybe... not sure!  The colours haven't come out quite right here, due to having to use the flash - the yellow is a nicer shade in real life.


I can't wait to get the squares finished and start getting it all sewn together!


Here is a picture of me with my sister-in-law and the 'nephew-bump'!!  This was taken in September, so the bump is bigger now!

I hope it won't be too long until I can do a 'ta-dah' post for the blanket!  It better be soon, as I think I'm getting repetitive strain injury from it - I've even started working on it at my desk on my lunch breaks!!  One of the young guys at work caught me the other day and commented "that is the funniest thing I have ever seen..." - slight exaggeration maybe!  :o)

Flower Keyring

I wrote this yesterday and meant to post it then!..........


Sorry - it's been two weeks since my last post - where did the time go?!


Well, I've been doing another bit of Saturday morning crafting in bed - love it!  This is what I have produced:

It's a flower keyring, stuffed with lavender, for a friend.  The picture is a bit dark - not much chance for bright photos these days!

I'm hoping my friend will like it - it's just a little something...

I'm going to a fireworks thing at her house tonight - should be good fun, and at least we can hide indoors if it's raining!


Hope you all have a fun weekend!

A Pretty Little Ta-Dah!

Finally I've started and finished something!!  A cute little cup cosy - and I love it!

Made with King Cole Bamboo yarn.

Lovely stripes in bright pink, light pink and white.  A mixture of single and double crochet. Although I wish I'd done it all in double crochet, as less rows would have been needed - making it quicker and leaving less ends to sew in!!  There were a total of 26 ends to sew in, in total!  A ridiculous amount for an item so small!!!  (Although I do like the look of wider and thinner rows together - so I guess it was worth it!)

Look at those gorgeous pale pink polka-dot buttons!  (Part of my giveaway from Jackie of Sew Special Bears - thanks Jackie!)  And bright pink polka-dot ribbon for an extra bit of detail!  Not at all because the join between the white border and the stripy ends looked like a big pile of poo - all gappy and holey and horrible, and I had to cover it up!  Not at all because of that....  (Sometimes the best "design features" are accidents or cover-ups!)

I love it!


Although, it really took rather a lot of time to make, considering what a mini project it is.  I had some grit stitch involved at one point, which I frogged as it just wasn't going right.  Then what with having to sew all those ends in, and keep fiddling about with and re-doing the white border before I eventually came up with the ribbon idea, which then had to be sewn on - well, it wasn't as quick as it should have been!  But, at least I'm happy with it!!


(I'll try not to think how many squares of the baby blanket I could have made while I was messing around with this unnecessary item!!)  :o)

Stupid Cowl!

Yes, stupid cowl!!  (And that's 'cowl', not 'cow', Jenny!  Hehe!  Although a cute little crocheted cow would be cool!)

It's too big now!  The first attempt would have been too small to get over my head - this one is too big!  Also, I'm not sure the stitches/yarn/hook size (something!) is right.  I just don't think it's working as a cowl.  I'm fed up with the whole idea!  I'm going to "frog" it.  (First time I've used that expression - look at me getting all "crochety" - picking up the terms!!)

Ah well, you live and learn.  Although not sure what I've learned?!  Not to make a cowl?!

What I've Been Up To...

Well, I've been busy painting my living room!  I'd been thinking of doing it for months, but couldn't bring myself to go through the hassle of actually doing it.  I was lying in bed on Saturday morning and I suddenly decided that the time had come!  Off I went to Homebase, bought a pot of paint and got to work!


I am loving it!  It is a Crown Naturals colour called Snowdrop, and looks so light and bright!  My living room doesn't get a lot of light (you may have read me whinging about my dingy flat in the past!) so this light colour really brightens it.  It was a light beigey colour before - which did look nice, and I did like it, but this is just lovely!  And it was time for a change, as I last painted it 5 and 1/2 years ago when I moved in.


I've still got one more coat to go on one wall - the most fiddley wall which has the window and the radiator on - lots of awkward places to try to paint around.  Typically I had painted that one wall a bit of a darker colour last time, so it needs three coats.  It would be the tricky wall that needs an extra coat - delightful!


I also had a family meal yesterday, to celebrate my brother's 30th birthday, which was lovely.  He is a big fan of sweets, so I made him this as an extra present:

I filled the bowl with blue shredded tissue paper and sweets.  I made the letters out of card and stuck them onto acetate, so that they were bobbing about above the bowl.

A bit more crochet has been done on the cowl and the baby blanket - but I will save that for another post!


Bye for now...

I've Started a Cowl!

I know I should be working on the baby blanket, but I had a sudden desire to make a scarf!  I'd seen this lovely scarf on Cupcakejojo's blog, which got me inspired!  I have also seen quite a few lovely cowls at Annaboo's house, here and here.  Check out both those blogs, they're amazing!

Well, I decided I wanted to do stripes inspired by Cupcakejojo, but a cowl inspired by Annaboo's house!  (Also, I thought a cowl would require less length, therefore less work, and there might be a slim chance I'd finish it!!)

For a while I've been loving ripple blankets - the pattern is from Attic24's blog.  I love this ripple blanket!  I've seen it on a few blogs, and adore it!  My lovely blogging friend Becky is actually making one over at The Fluff Pot!


So I thought maybe I'd make a stripey rippley cowl!  But things did not go to plan!


I don't really know what I was doing, but I got this far:

...then I realised that it wouldn't actually go over my head to get to my neck, once it was joined together!  I'd made it too small!  I'm not sure what was going on in my simple little brain!!

(Pictures aren't great as always - especially now it's getting dark earlier!)

So, I ripped it apart and started again!  (Annoying, as it took me ages to get that far!)  I decided that maybe the ripple is better left for a blanket or cushion... and have decided on a different design.  It's one I'm kind of making up as I go along.  I hope I will be able to show you a finished item at some point in the not too distant future!  For now, here is a glimpse...

A Few of my Favourite Things...

Hello!  I was just looking through my blog at some of the things I have made this year, and I thought I would do a post about a few of my favourite things.


I've not been making (or finishing!) much lately, so it was good to see some of the things I had finished when I was more 'in the zone'!


This post is like one of those episodes they do in a series, where they just recycle a load of clips from other episodes - I always hate those!  Oh dear, what a cop out!  :o)  Well, here goes...


The PE Bag I made for my friend's daughter: (post)

The funky cafetiere cosy: (post)

I really love that cafetiere cosy - I am extremely careful when making coffee, as I still live in fear of spilling anything on it!  (Not sure how washable it is!)


African Flowers which got turned into a hanging: (post)

Lavender heart: (post)

A couple of things I made for a Button Swap I was part of - a drawstring bag and a lavender bag: (post)

And that will do for now, as I can't be bothered to do any more!  :o)


Hope you're all having a great weekend!

Baby Blanket Progress

Here is the latest progress with the baby blanket for my nephew, due on Christmas Day.  I've got a way to go.  I'm not sure how many squares I'll need to do, but a lot more than six!