Another Mumsnet Blanket

You may remember I few months back I made some flowers to contribute towards a project for a bereaved family, one of whom was part of the mumsnet community? Well fate has reared it’s ugly head again. A mumsnetter has passed away, her death sadly announced by her husband. And in the intervening time another mumsnetter lost her 4 year old daughter in a tragic accident. I learnt this from the mother of this daughter on Twitter. Strange, you might think, that such information is shared in this way. I don’t think so. It’s no different to texting friends, emailing them, writing them letters. These people are part of a community. We are part of each other’s daily lives. And once again Mumsnetters are trying to do their bit to support these families. A blanket may seem trite, but what wouldn’t be trite? There is nothing that can be done to bring back lost loved ones. So you just do your little bit and hope that it can bring even just a tiny bit comfort.

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There is no denying it. Life is just really shit for some people. Little children shouldn’t lose their mums. Parents shouldn’t lose their four year old daughter. There is none of this that doesn’t suck.

So this is my tiny contribution. A square for a blanket. The yarn was kindly donated to me by another mumsnetter, so all I contributed was my time. The pattern for the square is here. While the finished product is quite nice, the pattern is hard to follow, though an experienced crocheter should be able to plough through it. Thanks to all the Mumsnet crafters who helped me with the pattern.

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Give your loved ones a squeeze tonight. Anyone who knows me will know that I am not a religious person, but there is no better way to say “there but for the grace of God go I.”

Yes, another post about spring from a blogger

Spring is my absolute favourite time of year. After the greyness of winter the green shoots of new life signal the burst of colour that is about to follow. Already I’ve seen crocuses and daffodils. I’m gutted that I didn’t get around to planting my own bulbs. And the kids and their friends decapitated my pansies today, removing the only colour in my garden besides the faded plastic of slides and see saws.

 

More than anything else about spring, I love blossom. There is very little that is quite as cheering as avenues filled with pink and white blossoming trees. In anticipation of the blossom blooming I quickly crocheted some of my own blossom to tie to some trees and keep me smiling until the real thing arrives.

Suffice to say the first picture was taken by me and my iPhone, and the second one was not only taken by DH (beautiful picture isn’t it?) but the yarn bomb was planted by DH while off taking photos at a wedding. So I have a new partner in crime now!

I was born in the spring, which may account for my affinity with the season. I almost feel reborn every time it comes around, like I get a little bit of myself back. So, that means I have a birthday coming up. And if one of my lovely friends or family are reading this blog I’d like to direct them towards this lovely spring bracelet from Goddess Jewels UK that would brighten up my day even further. They would also do well to mention to the lovely designer that I have wrists like a whippet (shame the rest of my body doesn’t match…).

 

Wonderwolf

Foxy!

As soon as I saw this fox on the Guardian website I fell in love and knew I’d have to make my own. I didn’t want to completely copy it, especially as I don’t have anything like that funky fabric. I ummed and ahhed over what sort of animal I could make that had the cuteness of a fox, while surrounded by my fabric stash. Owls are good, but a bit clichéd, everyone’s all about the owl. Penguins are unfailingly cute, but would look weird on my sofa in the way that a fox wouldn’t. I mean a fox could conceivably end up on my sofa, but a penguin not so much. Polar bear or baby seal, high on the cuteness scale, but all one colour so not much scope for pretty fabrics.

Swoon! From 'Yeah Baby Animals'

In the end I settled on a wolf. I know, not that cute, but neither is a fox when you really think about it, they’re a bit mangy aren’t they? So here is my wolf cushion:

He is made completely out of fabric and scraps from my stash. Stitch This may recognise the fabric for the body, as I bought it from her when she had a mega de-stashing session. What do you think I should call him?

And the post title, Wonder wolf? Well, while I was stuffing this little fella I was listening to a bit of Ryan Adams on Spotify. I think he’s been around for yonks, but I fell in love with his song ‘Desire’ which can be heard in a West Wing episode. Here he is singing the Oasis hit Wonderwall. Just thought I’d share 🙂

 

Love is Making It’s Way Back Home

I forgot to blog about the little Valentine’s Day present I sent to my mum. She reads my blog so I didn’t want to give the surprise away beforehand.

 

The idea came from Crochet Spot which has a pattern, but actually it’s as simple as can be, a crochet square folded into an envelope. This is a great project for novice crocheters who are just experimenting with squares but want to actually make something.

 

The origami heart comes from Girligami but there are instructions for a similar heart here.

 

While we are on the subject of love, you have to check out this video Love is Making It’s Way Back home, made solely with over 12,000 pieces of construction paper. It’s a visual delight. I came across this fab creation via the Meet Me at Mike’s blog.

 

Spread a little love yourself, you don’t need 12,000 pieces of paper! One is enough to make an origami heart for the one you love. Have a lovely day!

Sling when you’re winning

I’ve had an exhausting day today. My mum came up, along with my sister, sister in law and their respective sons. The boys are aged 20 months and 7 months, so along with my two you can imagine how full our little house seemed. I spent the day cleaning, shopping, cooking, baking and pacifying various children.

I gave my sister in law the mei tai sling that I was desperately trying to finish at 10.30 last night. I have several ‘pinjuries’ as a result but I’m pretty pleased with it.

There are some scrappy bits. I’m not brilliant with a sewing machine, and if truth be told I don’t love doing it. May I will love it more if I become better at it, vicious cycle really. But I do love the pleasure of having made something myself. And I just hope other people don’t see the scrappy bits which are glaringly obvious to me. This is the tutorial that I based the sling on, though without a headrest.

Hold on to your uteruses ladies!

Final update on the heart. Sadly no one game enough to email me their message. Nor did I hear from the flower recipient. However, a local photographer emailed me. He thought my heart was a great idea and blogged about it here.

Give away winner!

Ok, after all the yarn bombing excitement today I remembered that I had offered a give away. But first, I have been completely remiss in reporting my prize from another give away by So Resourceful. I recently received these lovely fabric dishes and zippered purse. I have yet found a use for them yet, it’s a case of not having anything special enough, and not wanting to just fill them with the usual crap! I’m absolutely delighted with them though, and suggest you all check out her blog for some of her other creations.

 

Anyway, to my give away. You can see all the entries in my custom made hat (duh! Just realising I could have used one of my new dishes!).

Not Betty as promised, but my beloved husband.

And the winner is….

Cassandra Parkin! Well done Cassandra! I will email you to get your details so I can send you Stitch and Sparkle!

 

Thanks for all the inspiration everyone. I have decided to go with the idea from Stitch This:

This is what I am going to stitch into my tiny frame, y'know, when I get around to it...

Look forward to showing you the end result!

The heart lives on but is romance dead?

So the 411 on the heart is it’s still there. Clearly people have written messages but no one has emailed any to me yet. I’ve taken a stake out position, as you can see above, and so far I’ve seen plenty of people look but no messages yet.

I did do one just to start the trend, here is one for my needy mother who demanded a message from me this morning:

I guess I should really write one for DH shouldn’t I…

UPDATE: I did catch some girls having a go – good on them! But where are all the romantic young men out there?

Write your message here!

I am so ridiculously excited by this yarn bomb. I expect you are all bored of me harping on about it by now, but you have to admit it looks awesome!

I was amazingly organised, I even whipped up a little eraser to rub out previous messages. If this doesn’t last till tomorrow I WILL actually cry! I’m going to check it out in broad daylight tomorrow over a stealth cup of tea. I may even leave a message for my own loved one…

 

This one is on a nearby bike rack. It reads “Pssst…forget to buy a Valentine’s present? I got your back. Give this to someone who deserves it” and I left my blog dtails. If you picked it up let me know!

And this one? Well, this one is a surprise for someone at a secret location…

 

Love bomb!

I’m just too impatient to save showing you my Valentine’s Day yarn bomb, so here it is, a sneak preview! It’s a large crochet heart (75x80cm) with some chalkboard vinyl sewn on to it. The idea is that people can write their own Valentine’s Day message and take a picture with their camera phones to send to a loved one.

So, details: well the heart was freestyled, starting with two treble crochets and adding an extra two in at each end to make the cone shape. To shape the top of the heart I crocheted 2tog at each end, then 3tog as I got to the top, pretty much just making it up as I went along (making sure to make a note of what I did on one side so I could replicate the other – unusually organised of me!).

 

The chalkcloth is from oilcloth.co.uk, left over from my chalkboard project. I drilled holes in it to make it easier to sew through.

 

The basket was another freestyle project. Hopefully the chalk will be safe and sound in here.

 

So that people know what to do, I wrote a special Valentine’s poem (with a bit of word smithing from Stitch This):

A 21^st Century Valentine

Roses are red, violets are blue,

You can send a Valentine too.

Write a message for your lover,

Tell them why they’re like no other.

If you’ve forgotten to send a card

Take a picture – it’s not hard!

And just so I can keep a log,

Send a copy to my blog.

I’m going to laminate it and leave it next to the heart. I’d be interested to know what you think, it’s not going up till tomorrow so still time to change it.

 

I went on a recce for locations today and this tree looks a likely candidate.

So, tomorrow night, me and my partner in crime (crime passionnel!) will be on a mission tomorrow night to spread love and joy 🙂 I’ll make sure I get a picture of it in situ. I may even do some surreptitious spying to see how it’s going down. It’d be a shame to leave it and not know what happened. A domain mes amour!

 

 

A Valentine rose

This isn’t my big V-day project, this is just a side project that I knocked up yesterday. I’m going to leave these tied up somewhere in town on Valentine’s Day for someone to give to their loved one. Ironically, DH and I don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day at all. We may use it as an excuse to get some nice food, but that is usually it. This Tuesday it will be Pizza Hut. The height of romance, no? But that is more due to it being half term and spending the day with Betty than anything else. All you can eat buffet and kids eat free. Don’t tell me that romance is dead.