Treats

Thank you so much for all your lovely good wishes for my birthday last week.  I really appreciate them.

I had a lovely birthday week with the wonderful surprise visit of Grace on the evening of my birthday.

I was so lucky to receive some fabulous presents, including a gorgeous project bag that Grace made for me.

I just love the polar bear fabric which Grace bought specially for me because she knows how much I love polar bears.

There's a lovely snowflake charm on the zip and it's lined with pink snowflake fabric.  It's just the perfect size to hold my latest sock project.

She also bought me this ball of sock yarn.  I love the colours and can't wait to cast on with this .

I have been ill the last few days - thankfully not on my actual birthday - so I've slept most of the last few days.  I've missed reading your blogs, so I'll be catching up today.  It'll be nice to get back into a normal routine. I hope you have a lovely week.  Bye for now.

Mini Balls of Yarn, Mini Sweaters and Mini Squares

Over the Advent period, my daughter Grace surprised me with random gifts of Opal mini balls of sock yarn.  It was a lovely treat.  I received five mini balls in total.

Aren't they just gorgeous and colourful.  Each ball is 10g each - just perfect for knitting up mini sweaters to add to the ones I've made previously.

With the leftovers I crocheted some mini squares.  I also raided my other sock yarn scraps and made them into squares.

Colours aren't showing up accurately -
but you get the idea.

I now have a total of 50 squares which I will add to as and when I have some leftovers.  Eventually I will sew them all together to make a colourful blanket.  It'll be a nice reminder of all the socks I've made over the coming years.  No rush for this though - it's definitely a long term project.

Now that I have enough mini sweaters, they are pegged up as bunting, and looking very jolly.

As with the squares, I will continue to make them, as they are a fun and quick project that is a useful way to use up and show off the leftover yarn.

I've written up the pattern for the mini sweaters and I'll publish it very shortly, once I've checked and finalised it.

I'm planning a weekend of Fair Isle knitting to try and get as much done as possible.  I hope you all have a good weekend and are able to find time to do something fun and relaxing.

Finishing off the Year

I hope you all had a fabulous Christmas.  It was wonderful having the girls back home, catching up and doing all the things we love doing together.  Eve has gone back to London now, but Grace and her boyfriend are still here for a few more days.

It's been a lazy few weeks and I've enjoyed plenty of knitting and crocheting time.

I knitted these mittens for the girls for Christmas.  They're lovely and snug.

Full details of the pattern (which is a free one) and the yarn used can be found here.

I also made some socks for my husband.

Full details of these, here.

I finished the crochet shawl I was making myself - another hot pink one!  I need to branch out into some new colours.

The yarn is gorgeous and soft and the pattern a nice easy one to work with.  Full details on Ravelry, here.

Grace and I cast on some socks on Christmas Eve.  I wanted to try something different than the usual recipe I use, so I made these toe up, using Judy's Magic Cast On, Fish Lips Kiss Heel and Jeny's Surprisingly Stretchy Bind off for the cuff.

I love the colours in this yarn and I particularly enjoyed the toe up construction of the socks.  I will be using this recipe again when I cast on for January socks.  Full details of my socks can be seen here.

And my final project for 2015 was some more fingerless mittens.  No particular reason for making them apart from I love the colours in the yarn which was leftover from some socks Grace knitted me earlier in the year.

Full details of the project are here.

We have nothing planned for tonight.  A few beers and a cosy evening with hubby looking back over the year.

It has been a very good year.  Nothing sensational happened to me,  but I've been happy and busy and I finish this year on a contented note - the best way to end the year.

I have my jar crammed full of happy memories of the year and I'm looking forward to reading through them all this evening and reliving the happy times.

Whatever celebrations you have planned for tonight, I wish you a very happy New Year.  Here's to another jar full of memories for 2016.

Mollie Revisited

Thank you all for your comments on my last post, and for sharing your true ages.  It was fun to read the variety of responses.

Today I'd like to show you some bits and pieces that I have made in the last few days.  Whilst considering what to make that doesn't involve knitting or crocheting, I consulted my back issues of Mollie Makes magazine.  I found two projects that were quick and fun to make.

The first is this cute little apple pin cushion from issue 6.

It's hand stitched, with felt for the stalk and leaf.

These would make nice little gifts for crafty friends.

In Mollie Makes, I also saw an idea to use washi tape to decorate a jam jar.

It makes a lovely decorative pencil jar.

I'm continuing to work my way through the magazine's.  I haven't looked at them for a while and it's surprising how new inspirations come from looking at the pages with new eyes.

Whatever you are doing today, I hope you find inspiration and time for a bit of creativity.

A Pretty Package Tied Up With Lace

Oh look!  An exciting package arrived in the post for me today.  Beautifully wrapped up with some lace.

I am the lucky winner of the Giveaway organised by Lorraine from Mama's Mercantile.  I love reading about her crafts, her family, her garden and her car boot treasures on her blog.  And here are the lovely goodies I have received.

Look at these beautiful buttons.  Such gorgeous colours.  And all beautifully presented.

I only have a small collection of buttons, so these will be a welcome addition.

I also received this cute needle-case made from lovely Harris Tweed.

And these greeting cards, also decorated with Harris Tweed.

It's a lovely feeling to win something.  It makes me feel special.  So thank you to Lorraine for organising her giveaway, it has made a lovely highlight to my week.

Fog!

Thank you everyone for your good wishes.  I'm pleased to say that my eye is getting better, not as rapidly as I would have hoped, but I'm optimistic that things will be back to normal in a few days time.  I haven't touched my crochet for days, it's been very trying!

I hope that you all enjoyed the Easter holiday.  Reading the blogs that I follow it seems that a lot of you have been out and about, visiting or gardening, enjoying lovely sunshine.  Here we have not been so lucky.  We've been shrouded in fog, cold and damp for the last few days, with the sound of the fog horn on the River Mersey as a background accompaniment.

We're on grey squirrel alert round here, to protect our lovely red squirrels.

Poor squirrels

This afternoon the weather is looking a bit more promising, and as I can't crochet, and I'm feeling inspired, I may step out into the garden and see what's what - hopefully nothing too scary.

Despite the weather we had a lovely weekend.  Both Grace and Eve were at home and it's always special when we're together.  Eve is busy working away on her dissertation, coursework and revision for her finals, so she was shut up in her room for most of the time, poor thing.

This was the first time we had all been together when there wasn't something else to celebrate, so we had postponed our Mothers Day celebrations until this weekend.  My lovely girls made me feel very appreciated.

I received some lovely gifts from them, including this book.

And this beautiful project bag.

This is the reverse side.

And lots of pockets inside, with a clip for scissors.

I am very lucky to have such thoughtful girls.

Well, I'd better get off into the garden, before my inspiration fades, and the fog returns!  See you soon.

A Birthday Gift

Here's a little something I made for my friend's birthday.

I saw something similar on Pinterest and thought it would be a great idea to make and then fill with little goodies.

I started by crocheting a doily in 4 ply cotton.

I then made a pouch - I made this bit up as I went along, it's not perfect but I'm happy with it.  It's lightly padded and lined with the same fabric as the outer shell.

I sewed in a label.

Then attached the doily and a pretty button.

It didn't take long to make and I think it looks quite good.  I hope she'll like it.