Craft actually

Cheeky Monkeys and other beasties

I'm still to master the art of crochet but my little sis Kirsty is very talented (generally but especially in this area). This cute monkey arrived in the post for my birthday. I've called him Cecil. He and Charlie seem to be getting on very well as they sit on my shelf above my craft area. I think Cecil might bat for the other team.  K assures me he's for me and not the Bean. Phew.

Something else adorable I just had to share with you, this photo Mum emailed me. Eric the Echidna has decided he likes all the landscaping work they have been doing in the garden on the Sunshine Coast lately and has decided to move in. Amazing - I don't think I've ever seen one of these in real life.  It makes the mangy urban foxy that hangs out in our garden look a bit tame.

Wedding Rug

My sis, Kirsty is a crochet extrodinaire.  She made this blanket for our wedding present. The colours are beautiful and its perfectly stitched. Its going to get a lot of use over winter.

The photo doesn't do it justice. Its been hard to get a day with decent light this summer.

Workshopping

The crotchet workshop at Gail's on Saturday was fab. Emma our teacher was patient and funny. She had us doubling and trebling away in no time. I was getting so confident by the end I attempted a ripple!

I met some lovely crafty ladies. And the cakes were amazing!

Since then I've attempted a few squares in an attempt to recreate the rug I posted about. I'm still pondering whether a mustard-yellow colour would look good with the colours below to liven it up a bit.

I haven't made much progress because instead of actually crocheting, I've been pouring over pictures of other people's crocheting on this Ripple Along Blog and the Flickr Group. I can't get enough of the amazing combination of coulours people use. Fabulous.

Never shy of jumping on a bandwagon I think I may have to get into the ripple thing. This free pattern by SusanB looks good.

Happy Easter

I hope you all had a lovely relaxing Easter. We spent a very enjoyable few days in Paris, meeting up with the Robbos on their world adventure. I discovered that travelling with an 8 month old baby (that I don't have to look after) allows plenty of time in the schedule for sock knitting. I finally managed to get around the heel of the first Turning Leaf sock. (You can see more of what we got up to here.)

Back in London we bravely ventured into Oxford Street today, via Hamleys. I said I just needed to pop into Liberty for a size 4 crotchet hook for Flibberty's workshop on Saturday. I was temporarily distracted by some nice yarn for this project...

 

...feeling a bit guilting I looked around, only to find the Robbos looking through knitting books and choosing yarn for a project for Granny to make for the bebe. Yay! Robert was talking very knowledgably about guage and cotton vs wool. Impressive! Then Robbo got into the groove and bought a tapestry project for the nursery wall. I felt quite satisfied turning another convert to the crafting dark side. It was a very successful trip indeed.