Mr Beans Blanket!

Yay! My first blanket is finished!! Heehee

 

 

Look at Mr Bean's blankety loveliness! He has been snuggled with it in his "Mini Man Chair" to watch Cbeebies for a few days now :-)

To be honest, I can't say I'm totally in love with it, the colour sequence looks lovely on someone elses blanket, but to be honest when I started making it I realised, as lovely as Attic24's colours are, they're just not "me". Anyhoo, more of that another day as I have plenty of ideas brewing... 

On a side note: Any tips on how to work edges on a stripey blanket (in particular the first round)? I fudged the sides a bit by doing 2dc in one row and then 1dc in the next row so they didn't make the blanket go ruffly. Any tips would me much appreciated! (See what I mean in the pic?)

Already pondering my next project as I've promised myself I MUST use up the remaining Lucy Pack before I buy "me" colours.

 

Toodly pip :-)

Weekly Weigh In!

First full week on WW and I have lost 3.5lb!

That is all :-)

The Smallest Things

The thing I love most about my children is their endless ability to find joy in the smallest things. I'm a great believer that kids don't need to be inundated with toys to be happy.

Yesterday was a perfect example:

Mr B has a thing for posting things places, it keeps him busy for hours. Yesterday when tidying up I found this:

It made me smile :-) (And yes, that is toast in a piggy bank)

Mrs snufflebean became completely infatuated with a paper envelope, there were tears and tantrums when we tried to remove it from her. Here she is in action:

I love the smallest things, they make my kids, and in turn me, smile and laugh from ear to ear. It makes the broken nights and temper tantrums fade away into the distance.

Life is good :-)

Mixed fortunes

Hmm.. Supposedly I've just completed my first week of weight watchers. Although, due to a fruit tart / McDonald's situation involving forgetting I was on a diet, I've managed to gain a pound. Not quite the brilliant start I was hoping for :-s

Anyhoo, onwards and upwards! I WILL stick to it next week and point everything! (Hopefully).

On a happier note, I've been crocheting away like a little gremlin and my first blanket keeps growing. It was intended as a pram blanket for Mrs Snufflebottom, however, Mr Bean has laid claim to it for his chair, so she'll have to wait for hers!!

Toodle pip!

P.S - it's quite chilly here today!

Silly for Stripes

I never thought I would say this but.... I am LOVING crocheting with acrylic. I took the plunge and ordered Stylecraft Special DK after hearing so many people rave about its lovely squishiness and easiness to work with. It arrived today, and I can't say I'm disappointed. 17 squidgy balls of loveliness!!

I've got straight to work making Mrs Snufflebottom a pram blanket. She's 7 months old, so past the teeny baby stage (which makes me a bit sad), but she's still small enough to need a blanket for her buggy. Only discovering this new thread and a renewed love of crochet when she's 7 months old has made me feel a bit pants, as we're not having any more babies, so my blanket making possibilities are limited :-( I'll just have to hope that my sister has babies soon! (hehe)

I have stolen a colour combination from The Stitch Sharer as my baby-frazzled brain couldn't organise the colours into an order I liked, and I'm too much of a control freak to pick colours randomly. I am working in stripes rather than granny clusters. I realllly wanted to follow the same pattern as Heather did for her Tiny Tin Bird pram blanket, but I was too scared of the blanket going wonky not to turn my work. So I have decided to do 2 rows of each colour, which still makes each row the same width but means I don't have to worry about the blanket leaning to one side. I am also going to very rudely steal the border pattern from this blanket.

On the recommendation of Scented Sweet Pea I ordered a Tulip Etimo Rose hook, as I was fed up of getting sore fingers and didn't have a 4mm hook. I would totally recommend them to anyone, yes they are pricey, but its so comfy to work with, I'm positively zooming along with my striping!

Heres a little sneaky peak...

Happiness!!

I've know how to crochet since I was about 13, my sister-in-law taught me how on a lazy summer holiday in Finland, and for years I only knew how to make one thing - A simple hat made of DC. After years of making the same thing, the prospect of the arrival of Mr Bean brought crochet back to me. I crocheted a simple granny square blanket, and I've been hooked (no pun intended), ever since.

Somehow I stumbled accross Lucy @ Attic24 & subsequently many others, and I have had an urge to make some of her wonderful squishy, colourful creations ever since.

Anyhoo, for fear of a divorce triggered by yarn overload in our house, a Christmas present Mr Bean received this year inspired me...

...and  I decided I was going to use all my odds and ends of cotton to make him a mini-blanket for his mini-chair. I used a pattern by Heather @ Little Tin Bird, although somehow I ended up working it slightly different to her, but not so different that it constitutes my own pattern. This is the result so far:

 

Its all a bit mish-mash and is annoying my over organised nature, but I am currently trying to be completely random in the colour selection. I'm struggling, I love how some people can be so free with their colour choices, because inevitably it works so well. This blanket isn't going to be a favourite, purely because its only come into existance to get rid of thread I've had hanging around for years & because I am overly excited at my big squidgy pack of Stylecraft Special DK thats coming in the post, along with a shiny new crochet hook. I have decided the first blanket I am going to make is going to be a copy of this pram blanket by Heather, but using the colours from Attic24's Granny Stripe

 

Right, off to wake Mr Bean up from his nap (whoops, left him to sleep a teeeny bit long as I got carried away with this)



Um...

In the dim and distant past that was my years at uni, I used to write a blog. Its long since been deleted and no doubt would have been completely cringeworthy to read back. Back then, I was adamant I'd never write one again, as they seemed to just be avenues to pour out self-pity and depression.

Here I am 10 years later, and after discovering that actually, blogs can be happy and silly and filled with colour and fun, I've decided that I might just give it another go...

I like to tweet, but sometimes 140 characters just isn't enough. I don't actually know what I want to blog about, I know I don't want to be a "mummy blogger" (theres nothing wrong with them, its just not my style) and my crochet isn't really established enough to write a blog of the likes of Attic24 (Totally amazing... go have a read). I do know that I want this blog to be filled with silliness, rambliness and colourfullness, I'm just not sure how I'm going to do that yet...

I had it all planned out in my head last night, I was going to write a fantastically entertaining first post but my eldest tiddler Mr Bean* (age 2), decided 4.52am was an acceptable time for "Downnnn" & "Cbeeeebies", and that put an end to everything witty stored up in my head, (or thats my excuse anyway)

Hmm off to ponder...

*Not his real name, obviously