creating makes me happy

So I have been looking for a new notebook to stash all of my creative ideas in and take down colour patterns that I like.
This morning I saw an advert on my facebook feed for a half price personalised moleskin notebook from http://www.urbancottageindustries.com/ and in purple!
This is perfect I thought. My only difficulty was choosing what to have debossed on my notebook. In the end, I chose

Creating makes me happy

I had a little problem with my order but received the most fantastic customer service, literally the best I have ever had.

Then, to make things even better, I received an email from them with a link in it to a video of my notebook being debossed with my special words -

Look at my little words!

This company is absolutely fantastic! I cannot recommend them enough!

Amigurumi Potted Plant

A little present I made to cheer a friend up:

Free pattern from here - http://www.lionbrand.com/patterns/80221AD.html

I just made this with some of my Stylecraft Special DK yarn stash. It is fairly easy and as soon as I had done the main part I went mad with my own colours for the flowers and I squeezed in a lot more than the pattern said!

My friend really liked the gift, it is so lovely to make something for someone who appreciates the time and effort you put in. I feel it is thousands of times better than just picking up something generic from a shop. I was able to choose her favourite colours and make it really special.

I do have to say I found it very hard to part with this one, I loved it....

This is why I am making another!!!

Until next time x

Granny stripe blanket growing..

Summer is here (sort of, not really, today it has rained all day, yesterday it rained all day etc)
I have been spending my spare time outside not sitting in front of the TV with my hooks and yarn. However, I have been 'casually' making some progress on my granny stripe blanket. It is getting quite big now!

Be warned, it does get boring so I might move on to something else at any time. Still on target for completion by the end of forever though.

Oh and just a quick photo of my helper:

I am fairly concerned that she thinks it is hers!

STARS

Writing about a colourful project completed a few weeks ago to brighten up this very wet and miserable day we've had..

So my house has stairs that curve and at one point as you are walking down the main part you are faced with a plain beige wall with a view of the full height of the building. I couldn't decide what to do with this wall as I was quite keen for the stairway to stay beige as it has no window so I wanted to keep it as light as possible, but I didn't want it to be dull! And then I created the hombre stars bunting below and I instantly knew it would hang perfectly from top to bottom of this wall!

One of each colour as they were being made -

The pattern is from an issue of Simply Crochet and I used the yarn recommended in the pattern - Drops Paris . This is my first use of 100% cotton yarn and it was magical!  I will most definitely use Drops yarn again. I bought one ball of each colour and there is a little left from each.

This is the stack of them all before they were strung together. Reminded me so much of a pile of coasters, I am tempted to make another lot and stiffen them!
Normally I would block things like this but as they were being hung on the wall I thought there would be little point as they would stretch a bit anyway when they were hung up.

And the Ta Daaaaa moment:

I had to ask the other half to help me hang this and due to the weight I had to put a few tacks in the wall every few stars to prevent the top ones being stretched too much. 

Thanks for reading, hope you love them as much as me and might be a little inspired ?!?!?! 

Mandala Madness

I've been taking advantage of the bank holiday weekend to get some crochet time in! As I have mentioned before I follow blog Attic24 which i love love love because of all the inspiration and easy to understand instructions. It is so clear that Lucy loves what she does so much and wants everyone else to love it too!
Anyway I am taking part in making mandalas - mandalas for yarndale and this is my creation!

It is so colourful and happy and it makes me smile! I would love to cover a little wall with them.

They are really quite simple to make if you aren't too worried about doing colour changes and they are so effective. There are a few different types of stitch here and as I was making this I was thinking it would make a nice showcase for a beginner to do as you could say "look I can do single crochet, double crochet, some chaining and a bit of treble crochet!"  Or is that a bit much for a beginner?  Either way it was fun and a much welcome break from the monotony of blanket production!

From 2 balls of yarn to this!

I finally felt I was confident enough in my crochet skills to risk money on a pattern, previous to this I had been learning using free patterns or from youtube. This is the one I chose, please meet Johnny the Monkey!

I am so so so pleased with this. He is super cute and not too difficult for a beginner, but you do need to be familiar with working in a spiral and make sure you have some stitch markers!

I found him here -  https://www.etsy.com/listing/105941111/amigurumi-pattern-johnny-the-monkey

My only notes are that the pattern is american and I wasn't sure what 'sport weight' yarn is. I used DK weight and he came out absolutely perfect. 

Out of control!

I am getting myself in a situation, there are lots of half finished projects collecting all over my studio (and spreading themselves through the house)

The list of shame:

• An elephant head on my desk! He has no body yet...
• Several uncomplete blankets collecting themselves about the place...
• The start of an Owl body...
• Some squares for a patchy cushion....
• This one-a-day (which is more like one-a-week) granny square project..
• One, yes one, wrist warmer
• A monkey head (I clearly have issues with animal bodies)
• And this little lot turned up today:

Oh my.

Chaos!

However as lots of hobby makers will say, it is as much the process of making as the finished product. So I am excused?!?! *Weeee skips away*