Love is in the air...

But every attempt I made to express my feelings ended up wonky and odd!  And yes I am talking about my knitting rather than today's big event!  

I did watch the Royal Wedding and I'm not ashamed to admit I shed a tear as they looked so beautiful and in love.  You've got to have a hard heart not to get warm and fuzzy feelings watching William's bashful little smiles at his stunning new bride.

Anyway, back to knitting, I was asked by someone on ravelry to make a 5 inch square to add to a blanket for a recently bereaved family.  The directions were simple, 5 inches, any pattern/design you want but there was a note that they would like to include hearts where possible and to use pinks, mauves, violets etc.  Never one to shy away from a challenge I decided to make up my own pattern including a heart. 

Four attempts later and I am no closer to achieving my goal.

Square number one - too big and when I tried to sew a heart onto it it looked like a 5 year old had been let loose with a blunt needle.

Square number two - too small and my first attempt at changing colour made the yarn all pinched and tight.

Square number three - somehow became a rectangle and the inset heart became long and squashed.

Square four - is slightly better but still no cigar!

Oh well, I'll keep trying...

The sun is shining so I made...

...another scarf!  Not entirely sure why I started this - I think I just wanted to do some crochet having made so many knitted projects which take me much longer.  I didn't have much of this yarn either so a scarf seemed the easy option - I must try to be more creative in future!

I'm calling this my portcullis scarf - because it looks like a portcullis (can you see what I did there?!  Isn't it clever?!).  It's basically a mesh with a twisted chain border, it was going to be scallops but I got confused and then decided to make the rest up.  It looks quite short but the yarn is really stretchy so it pulls a lot longer.

I saw my crafting guru Mai yesterday and she showed me the baby blankets she was making which looked great so that's my next project.  I'll be making that pattern up as I go along too so imagine there will be a fair amount of unpicking which is much easier with crochet!

I've not been crafting or blogging much recently, it must be the lovely weather as I've spent quite a bit of time pottering in the garden.  I've just planted some dwarf sunflowers and those big daisy type flowers I've forgotten the name of - hopefully they'll be bright and cheery. 

I also spent today trying to teach myself the harmonica - even though I've never played an instrument before and I can't read music!

As distraction techniques go, today was a triumph in ignoring the awkward situation I have got myself into with some unreciprocated flirting, oh well maybe I can woo the next guy with my rendition of 'Mary had a little lamb'  :)

Extra wide babies...

So I tried to make up my own pattern for a baby jumper using a 0-3 month old cardigan for a size guide.  It didn't go quite as well as I'd hoped - unless all babies are much much wider than they are tall...