Gruffalo!

A mouse took a stroll through the deep dark wood...

and wasn't scared at all by the tiny little gruffalo he met :-)

This little crochet gruffalo was made as a last minute gift for one of my lovely nieces and turned out so much better than I could have hoped for.

I used my Mini Panda pattern for the body, arms and legs, then added some different ears and horns before going all out with the embroidered details.

I love his simple body shape - I think if I had tried to come up with a proper head and body then it wouldn't have been half as cute. I also had such great fun with adding all the gruffalo details - the purple prickles especially :-)

This little guy was so admired by one of my friends that she has commissioned me to make one for her little boy, and because I love this gruffalo so much I'm very tempted to make one for myself too!

November's craft - Fail :-(

For this month's craft I wanted to try and make some simple tree decorations with a variation on salt dough that produces a white finished item when baked.

There is a great tutorial for making these on the woodside kitchen blog and the ones shown there look really lovely.

I mixed up my ingredients, cooked it on the hob until I had a clay and then cut out and baked my decorations which I decorated with snowflake stamps... all good so far, however after baking only half the recommended time they and dried out, bubbled up, cracked and fallen apart.

So either used the wrong ingredients (quite likely as I substituted cornflour for cornstarch and baking powder for baking soda) or I baked these too long.

I think I had best stick to crochet & felt to finish up the rest of the Christmas decorations I need to make!

Lest we forget

In memory of those who died to protect us in the 1st and 2nd World Wars.

Butterfly hair slides

Just finished working up a couple of pairs of butterfly hair clips as a1st birthday present for a friend's daughter.

I really love how well they turned out and now have grand plans about making heaps more to add to my Etsy store. I've even gone as far as buying another 100 hair clips...

(if you are wondering why my hands are a similar colour to the butterflies it's because it is very cold here in Tea Towers today - only 15 degrees - brrrrr)

Movember

Happy Movember everyone!

If you are visiting the UK this month and think there is a strange trend towards moustaches while you are here then let me reassure you that this is just for this one month and most of the men you'll see sporting moustaches are just trying to raise funds for male specific health issue like prostrate & testicular cancer.

This little felt moustache is from the book "Heart felt holidays" and was quick and simple to make. Perfect as a gift for any female friends who want to take part in Movember :-)

Happy Halloween!

Hope you all had a wonderful Halloween last night... we did, what with making Halloween cakes, wearing costumes and getting to trick or treat the neighbours. In fact we had such a good time I completely forgot to share this year's Halloween project with you...

Happy bats from Paper-and-string's super cute Halloween decoration tutorial. These little guys are great fun to make and make really lovely Halloween gifts.

Because I was crafting these in a last minute panic I got my felt colours reversed - the body should have been grey and the wings black... not to worry though as they still look like bats :-)

There was also a bit of Halloween baking taking place here too - we did a batch of scary ghost gingerbread biscuits to give out to the neighbours to say 'thank you' for our Halloween treats. I really liked being able to give something out to our neighbours and I'll definitely be doing this again next year :-)

So now we've scared all the ghosts and ghouls it's time to start thinking seriously about Christmas.... now that really is scary!


This post has been shared as part of Lakota's Ta da Tuesday.

Granny square love

A few weeks ago I got to teach a crochet class as part of JanJan Designs weekly 'crafternoon' sessions. The session was so much fun - we all had a great time making granny squares and everyone left delighted with their work.

To help with the class I made up a batch of example squares - I always find looking at a real piece of crochet so much more helpful than a photograph. So after the class I had a batch of squares left and as I couldn't face starting a blanket decided to turn them into a scarf instead...

October's craft: Icing :-)

Sorry for not posting a craft for September - I did try to do one, but it turned out so badly that I didn't even bother photographing my attempts...

So for October I thought I would give a bit of simple icing a go. First I made up a quick batch of gingerbread men from a recipe on the BBC food website. Then armed with a circle of greaseproof paper and some icing sugar had a go at making some icing and my first ever icing bag... and I'm very happy to say I managed it!

Icing bag in hand I got to work and before I knew it I had my own little army of gingerbread men... now to go and test a few :-)

October's decoration: Little birds

So sorry for the lack of posting over the last week - Tea Towers is in full party preparation mode as the big event is this Sunday and there is still lots to do.

Thankfully I've managed to make up all the party bags now and I'm really pleased with how they worked, love the look of the simple brown paper bags and I'm hopeful that their recipients will like the contents.

This is just a quick post with my latest Christmas decoration - yet another felt project from the wonderful "Fa la la felt". I took this project along to a new craft group this week and made a couple of the birds up to be sold in aid of The Christie, however the pattern really is very small so I copied it up a bit larger at home and made a couple more birds to add to my fast growing box of decorations. I really love the mix of blue & cream in these and again will have trouble giving them away.

Party preparations - party bags

After all the manic crafting to fill party bags with mostly homemade goodies I wanted to try and make my own bags to hold all of the stash. After a quick search on google I came across this tutorial for making newspaper gift bags and after tweaking it a little ended up with a stack of these brown kraft paper bags.

Now I stuck deciding whether to decorate these or not... any suggestions?

Special cushion - by JanJan Designs

My mum is having a very special Birthday today - happy 70th mum!

Because I wanted to give her something extra special to help mark the event I got in touch with Janet from JanJan Designs.

Janet makes the most beautiful cushions and by scanning in a photo which she prints on to special printable fabric she then creates one of a kind cushions. I managed to get hold of a photo of my mum back when she was still a toddler and Janet turned it into this beautiful cushion.

Because my mum loves green Janet decided to 'frame' the photo with some green satin ribbon, lace and mother of pearl buttons. The green and pink rose backing fabric is lovely too and I especially like the hot pink pipping around the edge.

Thanks for doing such a beautiful cushion Janet I'm sure my mum is going to love it!

Party preparations - spin balls

While planning party bags I hit the problem of what do I made for the little brothers & sisters who will also be turning up? Most of what I've made so far isn't particular suitable for under 1s so I thought I would give these cute 'spin balls' a try.

These are made from another great free pattern (only available as a Ravelry download though) written by Abigail Gonzalez. The spiralling effect gives a lovely even striping on the ball with no jumps in the colours and these are just the right size for little baby hands to hold.

Party preparations - zipper pouches

These little simple zipper pouches were the next item on my party bag to-do list. No pattern this time just a stack of lovely organic fabric (screen printed by Showpony) that I won two years ago.

Because this fabric seemed to fray quite easily I wanted to try out french seams in an effort to make a more durable pouch. I also gave putting in zips another go and after a bit more practice and the occasional curse I managed to get my sewing machine to sew in a zip on each pouch quite neatly.

For the girls I chose the pretty flower & butterfly print as well as a couple of summer tree pouches (my favourite design in my fabric bundle) and for the boys it had to be the insect soup - nasty pattern - I hope they like them!

Party preparations - paper books

For my next party bag filler I decided to make up some very simple blank books which I thought would be popular for doodling on the go.

The instructions I used were from glittergoods blog (mini book tutorial) and with the aid of a guillotine to chop up a stack of A4 sugar paper this was a very quick make. The trickiest part was making the holes in the spine before sewing the pages together.

These little books are pretty cute and would look even cuter with some sort of cover... however I'm now running short on time so I just kept them simple.

To the Batmobile!

This little crochet hero is ready to fly into action

Kazam!

Kapow!

My little Batman was made from another fabulous free pattern by Emjay Bailey which is available from her blog Nerdigurumi.

Will this superhero manage to save the day and help me get all my last minute crafting done in time? I really, really hope so!

Baby blue

Two years ago I made a little crochet dress (pattern by Marianne Cant in issue 9 of Inside Crochet) for my new niece and because I loved making it so much I've been desperate to make another. Thankfully I have lots of friends who are also mums so it was only a matter of time for one of those to have another baby, but it did take a while for a little girl to arrive.

While I adore the colours in the yarn I used for my niece's dress I wanted to make something that wasn't pink this time (possibly because I'm suffering from pink overload in the clothes for my own little girl) and choose the 'Skyway' colour way from the Wendy Happy yarn range. The yarn was a joy to work with again - so soft and smooth that it crocheted up really quickly. The colour changes in this colourway were much shorter though which gives a dappled effect and though it is also quite pretty I think I like the striping on my first dress better.

Making this dress up has been a lovely change from all the 'work' crochet I've been busy with. My crochet business "Pretty Crochet Things" is being a little neglected at the moment due to having so much to plan and prepare for right now. I do have lots to share with you including the new finished items, and once I get through an incredibly busy September I'll be sure to show you what I've been so busy with!

September's decoration: Felt Christmas pudding

Wow - look how early I've managed to get this month's Christmas decoration done!

Once you've recovered from your shock at seeing this month's Christmas decoration complete I'll have to admit that the reason I've made this so quickly is that I won the kit in a giveaway and just couldn't wait to get started on it.

I'm a huge fan of the paper-and-string blog and I love all the beautiful felt products that Sarah sells in her shop so I was delighted when she let me know that I had won one. She usually runs one giveaway each month but as she was bringing out a new range of Christmas goodies she decided to hold a whole week of giveaways.

My favourite out of her Christmas tree decorations (part of her 'sew your own' range) was this little cheerful Christmas pudding - simple and very, very cute. I'm tempted to raid my ribbon stash and have a go at making a few more as presents, but this little guy will definitely be added to my own Christmas tree decorations as I just can't bear to part with him.

Her kits contain everything you need to make your own decoration (apart from a needle and the thread) even the stuffing! The ribbons and button included are just adorable and make the finished item extra special :-)

Eggsterminate!

Hooray for the new series of Dr. Who!

To celebrate his return what could be more appropriate than a little crochet dalek?

As well as scaring the unsuspecting lunch time dinner he will also do a really good job of keeping your egg nice and cosy. Watch out that he doesn't take a liking for your salt and pepper pots and breed more little daleks though...

The pattern is fantastic and you can find it here as a google doc or through the Ravelry pattern page http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/dalek-egg-cosy. Quick and easy to make - who wouldn't want one of these?

Pencil toppers - 2nd batch

After much cutting away at my stash of felt I ended up with a load of these little felt pieces - ready to be turned into cupcake pencil toppers.

The quick tutorial for how to make these is over on the Whimsy love blog along with a lovely collection of mushroom, owl & acorn pencil toppers that I was also very tempted to have a go at.

After a bit of a sift through my craft stash I found a few pink/purple sequins to use as sprinkles (Sam calls my sequins "secrets" which is sweet but confusing...) and I made a start.

Because these cupcakes use 4 pieces of felt (unlike the cars I made which only use 2) they were a bit trickier to put together, I found trying to line up both sides of the cupcake a little tricky but after sewing together the first couple I got the hang of it.

All of my pencil toppers have been sewn by hand as I'm definitely not good enough with my sewing machine to trust trying to sew such small pieces of felt, so they have ended up looking a little bit more 'homemade' than the ones on the Whimsy love blog. 

I'm really pleased with these and all ready to get cracking on more party bag projects :-)

August's decoration: Felt baubles & bells

These adorable felt decorations are so pretty that I really don't want to give them away. The pattern is from the Christmas 2011 issue of Mollie Makes and I kept as close to the colours they used as I could.

They are very simple to make - just two pieces of felt cut into a bell or bauble shape and decorated with chain stitch and 'lazy daisy' flowers. I embroidered both sides of my decorations which took a little extra time but I think it was well worth the effort.

Yummy mushrooms!

These little amigurumi Mario mushrooms (free pattern by Linda Potts) were made as a quick present for my husband. I've booked marked a whole ton of 'geeky' amigurumi patterns as they make such great gifts for him.

They are super quick to make and who doesn't need a "Super mushroom" or even an "Extra life mushroom" occasionally?

Party preparations

My little boy is not going to be little for much longer - in only a couple of months he will be a staggering 4 years old. Because we've kept his past Birthdays pretty low key so far we really wanted to hold a bit more of a party for him this year and invite some of the friends he has made in our new Northern home.

We've been lucky enough to be invited to quite a few toddler Birthday parties so I've got plenty of ideas for how I want to organise it including what sort of games to play (though based on my toddler party experience it may be tricky to get all the little ones joining in - any tips?).

I've also been thinking pretty hard about the party bags - I want to give everyone some lovely things but I don't want to spend a fortune... so I'm going to try and craft my way through most of the contents in the hopes of keeping costs down.

So I've got two months to try and craft the contents of about 17 toddler & baby party bags, to help me in my quest I found a really great post on the Crafty Crow blog which links to a great range of tutorials for making party gifts (party favour post). There are tons of ideas to explore but to start with I wanted to try and make some felt pencil toppers starting with these super cute felt cars from One Crafty Mumma.

Aren't these little cars adorable - I especially love their little button wheels :-)

Right I'm now off to start cutting out a stack of ice cream felt shapes for the next lot of pencil toppers...

August's craft: Pyrography

Pyrography is simply put - wood burning. You can either use a specialist tool like the one in this photo or something similar like a soldering iron.

One of my recent Birthday presents was a book on pyrography and a wood burning pen - very exciting! So after raiding the garage for a spare bit of wood to practice making marks on, my mother in law and I had a go. We spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out which nibs to use first and after a bit of playing we both managed to produce a few different effects.

My first impressions were that it was much trickier than I had anticipated - the projects in my new pyrography book are all so beautifully produced that looking at my own scruffy efforts was a little disheartening. However, after a good nights sleep I decided to get back in and see what I could do second time around. Though I still found the pen hard to use (due to the tip needing to get very hot to use you have to hold the pen much further down - it's not at all like how you would use a normal ink pen) my second attempts were much, much better and I even had a go at a simple leaf design on a basic wood picture frame.

I now have a slightly burnt tea towel (I got impatient for the pen to cool down enough to change nibs and tried using a tea towel to do it while it was still hot - not a very smart idea) but I'm keen to do more and will now be actively looking for wooden things to decorate... hopefully I find some quick as I may have to resort to practicing on our furniture!

Fresh all year long

Crochet roses are becoming increasingly appealing to me. My own attempts at keeping houseplants going is usually a fight between over watering them and forgetting them completely until they are past saving... I have a new lily that I am worried about - it seems to be starting to die back and I think it too is going also end up in the green garden waste bin in the sky.

These crochet roses are super simple to make and are also slightly addictive. I started out trying to make a handful as a present for a grandma in hospital and I ended up with far more than I originally intended as I couldn't stop myself making 'just one' more to add to the bunch. The pattern is another freebie from the wonderful PlanetJune website (http://www.planetjune.com/). June has even used this pattern to teach crochet to beginners so it is very simple - but gives such lovely results!

I've also crocheted up another quick pair of crochet rose hairslides - this time in a more traditional rose red colour. I love how old fashioned and delicate these turn out and if I was 20 years younger I would definitely be sporting a pair myself.

Now if I had more time for 'self' crochet then I would start making some crochet roses to decorate Tea Towers with - every time I visit the talented 'Mrs Twins' blog I admire her lovely birdcages decorated with crochet roses - so very pretty.

Do you have any favourite crochet flower patterns? If you do then please share - just because the weather is gloomy outside doesn't mean that we can't bring a bit of Summer into our homes!

July's decoration: Mini crochet stars

Just finished up a batch of these cute granny style Christmas stars up using crochet thread. I just need to find my gold crochet thread to make hanging loops for them and then they too can go in the Christmas box.

The pattern is very simple and includes a great photo tutorial so well worth having a go at if you are stuck for a last minute Christmas present. I think these would also look great strung together as a Christmas garland... I may even give that a go too!

The pattern is by Michelle Kludas and you can find it on her blog here - Grandma Twinkle pattern

July's craft - Machine sewing

In my on-going quest to tame the sewing machine I went to one of the 'crafternoon' sessions being held locally at Traders outlet. The session was to make reversible handbags - a simple pattern but involving sewing in curves so quite tricky for a novice like me.

Being able to sit and concentrate on some craft for a whole afternoon was a real treat - Rich took the two little ones out for the morning while I got to indulge my crafty side as well as eating up some very tasty home made muffins.

These are the two bags that I made up - they need a quick iron but I'm really happy with how they turned out. They don't need any buttons or zips to close, all you have to do is thread the longer strap through the shorter strap and it hands around your wrist.  To give them a finishing touch I think I'll just make up some crochet flowers and then into the Christmas box they will go!

I'm going to be teaching a crochet crafternoon some time in September so if you are local then do get in touch and I'll send you the details.

Thanks to my mother-in-law for paying for this as one of my presents - I had a lovely time!

Hot glue magic

There has been so much crafting here in Tea towers that I hardly know what to show you first... so I thought I would quickly share with you a photo of my newest piece of craft equipment - this cute little pink hot glue gun :-)

I've recently had my Birthday so I have quite a pile of new craft books to read through and drool over as well as tons of chocolate and a few beautifully made presents from my lovely sisters, so when I get a chance I'll be posting about them.

Squares for SIBOL

Though you might not think it from my recent lack of posting I have been doing quite a lot of crochet recently.

These two squares are for the SIBOL group - a lovely group of ladies organised by the fantastic Mrs Twins (Sue) who takes in all our squares and then with a little magic and a huge amount of work turns them into lap blankets for the elderly in care.

She was also asking for some extra butterflies so using my recent butterfly pattern I've made her up a small stack in some of my favourite blues - I hope she likes them, and I can't wait to see what she does with my two squares :-)

June's decoration: Felt hearts

After a day of unsuccessful crocheting I needed a break so I dug out my back copies of Mollie Makes magazine and found that I had marked these felt hearts as a quick project to try.

These hearts were very quick and satisfying... once I had cut out the felt heart shapes I started adding buttons from my stash and had a great time picking them out and sewing them on. Once the buttons were all on it was a very quick job to join the hearts with a running stitch, add a ribbon hanging loop and stuff them lightly.

Ahhh - feeling much better now, nothing like an enjoyable couple of hours of crafting to help you relax :-)

June's craft: Quilting

To give me a break from all the crocheting I've been doing for my new Etsy shop I thought I would make a start on my lovely 'Art girl quilt kit' which I won from believemagic last month.

Well - it would seem that making art quilts are a little addictive and I've not been able to leave this one alone, and now it's finished!

I embellished my pretty girl with a little ruffled apron and a crochet flower for her hair. I did a bit of free hand embroidered writing for the 'Time for Tea' which is okayish - but could do with being a bit more central.

This quilt has a little bit of everything, blanket stitching, patchwork, hand quilting & my first ever attempt to add bias binding. Not too sure what to do with my pretty girl now but I'm sure I'll find somewhere in our home to display her proudly :-)

A 'rabble' of butterflies

This pretty little rabble* are the reason why I've not been keeping up with my blog posts recently... butterflies seem to be taking over here in Tea Towers and they are pretty much all I can think of.

These butterfly motifs are my latest crochet design and I love how they have turned out. This batch of butterflies have been made up using Debbie Bliss cotton DK yarn in 8 of their gorgeous colours.

Once I've finished up a few garlands I'll be making some extra butterflies to send to the wonderful SIBOL project - I've been terrible about sending in squares so I really need to make it up to them :-)

* - according to wikianswers a rabble is the most common way of describing a group of butterflies.

Busy butterfly

Life here has been incredibly hectic over the past month which is why I've not managed to do any of my regular craft posts or do my monthly new craft/new decoration.

My new business focused blog Pretty Crochet Things is doing really well with a new group of followers who came round because of my recent giveaway. I've also been busy showing my new bootie range off to friends and local mums so hopefully I'll start making a few sales soon :-)

I'm also working on getting a few new items designed for my shop, and because I love butterflies so much I'm thinking about doing some butterfly hairslides and some pretty butterfly garlands (like this quick prototype garland). Have you got any suggestions for crochet items that you would like to see me sell? At the moment I'm focusing on small items like baby bits & accessories and any ideas I get now may well become finished items stocked in my Etsy shop.

This garland was made for my recent Butterfly Tea Party - an event that I've been planning for well over a month. The party involved having a good few friends round to my home yesterday and provided them with tea & plenty of cake as well as selling my selection of Phoenix cards to them - all in the aid of the wonderful charity 'Together for short lives'.

There were butterflies everywhere, I punched a load of paper butterflies to decorate the cake table, I made butterfly cakes & butterfly shortbread, there was a butterfly hunt set up in the garden & butterfly outlines for the kids to colour in and have laminated as placemats. People even came with butterfly clothes on and those who didn't I made sure went away with a butterfly sticker!

My lucky day!

I've just found out that I've won the giveaway at believemagic - I can't believe it though as I never win anything. Very excited about this - the giveaway is for a fantastic 'creative girl art quilt kit' which I can't wait to have a go at and will be making up for my own little girl.

My own little giveaway over on Pretty Crochet Things was also a success and I've now got a good few new followers there which is lovely.

Giveaway over on Pretty Crochet Things

I've just realised that I'm late again for the Sew Mama Sew giveaway - however as I'm determined to join in this year I've written up a quick giveaway post on my 'Pretty Crochet Things' blog.

I'll be giving away a pair of my lovely little baby booties over there so be sure to hop on over and enter if you want to be in with a chance of winning.

My giveaway post will be open until 25th May, good luck all!

Butterfly crazy

Butterflies are beautiful - they flutter and flitter and as far as I can tell are only there to be admired. 

It's partly because of my love of butterflies that I've not been able to do much blogging this month. I'm in the middle of organising a 'Butterfly tea party' in aid of 'Together for short lives' a wonderful charity that supports children and their families who aren't expected to reach adulthood.

These little butterfly hair clips are going to be included in the prize raffle I'm putting together  - aren't they lovely? The 'Butterfly grace' pattern is available as a free Ravelry download and is well worth having a go at.  

So things may well be quiet for the next couple of weeks here while I madly dash about trying to organise my first proper charity function - don't worry too much though as I fully intend to do some more butterfly related crochet which I'll share with you properly once the craziness is over.

Finally open for business!

It has been almost a year since I decided to try and sell a few of my crochet items and today I've finally managed to do it.

My little Etsy shop is stocked up with a range of my booties in different yarns and colours - 12 different bootie types in all. Some of these have flower embellishments, and a few of those embellishments are optional for no added cost.

These first 12 booties are hopefully the first of many - I'll see how these sell and depending on what feedback I receive I'll tailor my range to suit my customers.

I'm really pleased with the small stock I have added to my store today - they are all made with love and care and I'm proud of each and every bootie :-)

If you want to keep up with all my new shop news then take a look at my crochet business blog - Pretty Crochet Things, I'll be posting up photos of any new items I add to my shop as well as filling you in with how it is all going.

What a lucky girl I am!

We have no doorbell at the moment (we've just had new carpets fitted and the lovely men who fitted it seem to have wandered off with the doorbell plug socket thingie) so when the postman came round yesterday with a surprise package we very almost missed it. Luck was with us as we happened to notice the van outside and Rich dashed down just in time.

This very beautiful blanket was in the parcel (as well as a train cake silicone mold which I can't wait to try out) and it came as a complete surprise. My lovely sister Liz seems to have been very busy crocheting this up for our home and it is simply stunning! She has such a good eye for unusual colour combinations - some really striking squares with all sorts of colours that I would never have thought to put together but they work so well. Liz is also proud of the fact that she is learning to do different squares, there are a whole range of different motifs to be found in this blanket and all of them are worked so beautifully.

This blanket is now living in our sitting room so that it will always be on hand to snuggle up in, luckily it's big enough that all the family should fit under it as otherwise I'm sure there would be arguments about who gets to have it! Thank you ever so much Liz - this blanket means so much to me and I am so in awe of your fantastic workmanship :-)

April's craft: Knitting

Just managed to squeeze in my new craft for this month - only just though!

This little knitted heart is the first thing I've knitted for over 15 years! I taught myself to knit as a teenager and could do the basic stitches as well as a little shaping, but apart from making a couple of teddy bears I never got around to doing much with my new skill... then I started to crochet and that just took over!

I've been meaning to pick up my needles again for a while though and after figuring out how to cast on (such a fiddly thing to do - reminds me so much of playing cat's cradle) it all came back pretty easily. Making this heart took a good couple of hours though and left me with very sore and crampy hands, so I'm not sure if I'll be doing any more knitting any time soon!