Crochet Elephant Snuggie for Baby

I recently need a gender neutral present for a new born baby, and I wanted it to come together quickly and easily, but still be cute!

I used this pattern, and once I'd got my head round the granny square part it came together nicely! The grey and turquoise are both Stylecraft DK, and the white and cream are from my stash. I will definitely be making more of these, hopefully with different animals!

(Belated) Mother's Day Cards!

So, I made these back in February for Mother's Day! I knew I wanted simple felt flower based cards, but I was a bit stumped beyond that. I had this flower shape in my folder of templates I've made previously, and I dived into my felt and button collections for complementing colours.

I really didn't know what to do for the background, but with some playing around I came up with this super simple impression of a flower stalk using pearl paper cut outs. It's definitely a technique I intend to use again!

Rainbow Crochet Blanket

If you follow me on Facebook, you will have seen lots of progress shots of this blanket as I've worked on it! It took me less than 6 weeks to make a single bed sized blanket, which I am so proud of! I also made a matching granny rabbit using this pattern. She's called Fizzy, and she has every colour from the blanket on her somewhere!

I used this pattern, Stylecraft's Blanket 9091. But... I changed it up a bit! Firstly, I kept it to single stripes of each colour all the way through, instead of switching to double width stripes part way through, as the pattern suggests. I also added an extra 2 and a bit balls of grey wool to take it up to a bigger blanket size - I think mine is wider than the pattern as well as longer! There are two colour options for this blanket, and I went for the cheaper Stylecraft DK. It's not the same as the one pictured in the pattern, but I love it :)

I may have caught the blanket making bug, which my wallet really cannot afford!

Star Wars Revan Birthday Cake

When I asked my husband what he would like his Birthday cake to be, he immediately said "Revan!" I was hardly surprised since our world seems to be revolving around Revan at the moment, with my husband having just started writing his first Star Wars novel, Revan's Rebirth!

I winged this cake more than I want to admit, but I am thrilled with how it came out! I used this marble cake recipe, but the vanilla batter is coloured bright red! I used Renshaw's grey and poppy red icings to cover the cake, and then added shading using gel food colouring - liquorice black and dark brown - and a paint brush, and finished it off with a layer of antique silver shimmer dust! I think it really captures the worn metallic look.

Cockatiels Watercolour

Rather than giving my husband cards, I try to give him paintings and drawings which can adorn our walls all year round! The only members of our animal family missing from our walls were our beautiful birds, Georgie (left) and Patch (right).

I really enjoyed picking up my watercolours again, and approached them with a gentler technique for me, really building up colour slowly. I think it works really well with the feathers. I also really enjoyed using my water brushes for this project, I felt so much more control over tone.

Georgie is a very shy bird, so not only did she make it very difficult for me to take reference photos, I thought it was apt for her to be hiding behind Patch, as that is how we normally see her anyway!

Bunny Bunting [Great for Spring!]

I'm afraid I've been a naughty blogger... Not only have I not posted in over a month, I can't find the source of my original inspiration for this bunny bunting! You will find it in various forms across the internet though :) We are bunny-mad in our household, and when I saw this idea I knew it would be perfect to decorate the area of the house which our rabbits spend their time playing in. But, it would also make a great spring time craft, especially if you throw some spring colours and pretty papers in :)

It was a lovely simply make, textured card from WHSmith, fork pom poms (I still don't love the method, but I tied them slightly differently and trimmed them down, and they worked for this!) and some twine I had to hand - I wanted to use ribbon but I didn't have any in the right colour/length/width combination! Always the way. I enjoy a bit of craftiness decorating the house, and with my husband always in mind, this is cute without being garish!