Out and About

Hello Lovelies,
Everywhere I turn this week there is something floral and pretty asking to be photographed so I hope you don't mind another outdoors post :0)

Yesterday was really warm with not a cloud in the sky. The daffodils looked radiant in the sunshine....

Further along the street I'm loving the pink blossom paired with the bright red Telephone box ( and of course the wonderfully blue sky ).........

Purple aubrietia cascading down a wall........

In town I have to take a break from the shopping to visit the park, and I'm so happy to find wonderful primulas and more frothy blossom..........

In the countryside the tree buds are opening up at last.........

Isn't this an amazing zingy green.


Sorry but more Daffodils, such a happy flower, they always make me smile.........

Another favorite spring flower of mine, grape hyacinths are growing in the verge. They look wonderful in a natural setting .........

Back home I've been making spring flowers of my own :0)........



This is very much a work in progress, Inspired by Lucy's post . I know it will not compare to  Caroline's wonderful collages but I'm so enjoying the thinking and planning ,drawing and cutting. It feels fun to create with paper for a change :0)
The weekend is nearly here ...yay.
Jacquie x

Evening Light

Hello Lovelies,
yesterday was a beautiful,sunny spring day. Returning home from the park at six in the evening I was delighted by the way the sunlight was shining through the petals of the Hyacinths in our front garden.

The air was warm and still and their scent was fabulous.....

I LOVE that these blooms ,bought to cheer up and dark winter day indoors ,do so well after being plonked in the ground after they have faded.

I have this years crop waiting to be planted ...must get on with that soon.The Idea of having more of the beauties to welcome me home next spring makes me very happy........

The lengthening days and the fact that we changed the clocks yesterday meant it was still light at seven pm. I popped into the garden to fetch in the washing and noticed a neighbors willow tree was looking very green.......

Then I realized the sun would be setting and if I was quick I would be able to see it . So I left the rest of the dry washing on the line and trotted up the road in my garden crocks ( not the easiest thing to trot in !) . Once I got to a gap in the hedge I was distracted by how big this years crop is already. It's rape seed and it looked as though it would start flowering any day.........

The trees are still mostly bare and the hedgerows are brown but a close look shows they too will be green very soon......

Ahhhhhhhh, here is what I hoped to see........

A beautiful sunset :0)

On a different theme , I wanted to share another baby hat I made over the weekend. On Friday I found out the baby I had made a gender neutral hat for is a girl so I could not resist hooking a pretty pink and lilac version .....

Hope you have a good Spring/Autumn week.
Jacquie x

Spring Equinox ....and some more Crochet

Hello Lovelies,

It's  the first official day of spring (for those of us in the the northern hemisphere) ....after today day there will be more daylight than dark ...hurray !!

I went for a little walk with my camera this morning...looking for spring things and found these.......

Such spring prettiness makes me very happy.

When I got back I felt inspired to tidy our conservatory. It's not a space that gets lived in much in the winter and it tends to get cluttered up with stuff.Now the weather is warming up we will be using it more......

On my tumble dryer side table I popped my latest crochet to show you . Did you notice it ? Here's a closer picture.......

Cute baby hats !!!
 The first of these (the stripy one )came about because I'm currently working with a really lovely young lady who is expecting her first baby in a few weeks. When I finished my Elmer blanket I was very tempted to wrap it up and give it to her . But I have to remember I'm trying to raise funds for charity with my crochet this year so giving away a project that took two and a half weeks to complete was not really a good idea. So to compromise I decided to make a small something instead. One evenings crochet and I ended up with this......

I'm really pleased with how it turned out.It's newborn size and on the other side I made a feature of the colour changes and I like this effect too.......

It's my own , very simple pattern.
I'm not good at choosing gifts and began to wonder if this design , with all it's colours and tufty bits was a bit over the top for most peoples taste.
Thinking more about what I liked for my own babies ( it's quite a long time ago now ! ) I remembered a favourite snow suit that my youngest had, it was cream and had little ears on the hood, yes a hat with bears ears is cute I think. I've adapted Ali's pattern ...adding more increases as they were making up very small and using two strands of double knitting weight yarn together because I did not have any chunky yarn. I love how these turned out too.........

These are super fast to make ....I made both of these on Monday evening and I started another ,using chunky yarn this time, while sitting in the spring sunshine and enjoying a tasty treat this afternoon.....

I'm planing on giving one to the Mum to be and I'll be putting the others in my (yet to be opened ) on line shop.

Thank you all so much for the wonderful comments on my Elmer blanket ,you are all too kind ,
Jacquie x
P.S anybody notice the unusual fruit in my bowl.......boys :0)

Elmer Blanket Ta-dah

Hello Lovelies,
I'm back with a ta-dah ....my latest baby blanket . I think many of you who blog will know how this sharing is such a wonderful part of being creative. At home this sort of make would go largely unnoticed but here there are lots of like minded lovelies who see colourful crochet through the same eyes as me....it really makes me happy to look at these pictures and I hope you feel at bit happy/inspired by them too.

Here is my "Elmer" blanket , once again it's inspiration came from HERE .

Ta-dah!!!!!!!!.........

It's made up of 99 three round granny squares joined as you go.Once again the yarn is stylecraft acrylic. I love the way it goes so well with my baby ripple....also made from mostly the same colours of this yarn......

In case you were wondering there are 19 colours in total and they are listed here:-

Aspen,Aster,Apricot,Bluebell,Cloud,Grape,Lemon,Lipstick,Lavender,Meadow,
Plum,Raspberry,Saffron,Shrimp,Sherbet,Spring Green,Turquoise,Violet and Wisteria.

I made a border using six rounds of granny clusters and a picot edge to finish. .........

Oooooooh, I always love a washing line shot and I'm really happy with the way this blanket has turned out.
I even love the back, were the little spikes created by the join as you go method are more visible . This effect kind of reminds me of a jig-saw.........

The blanket measures 34inches by 28inches ( 86 x 71 cm) and will be put in my online shop as soon as I've made more stock to open one :0)
 I'm  hoping  to raise some funds for the cancer charity I've chosen to run for this year.

The weather has been pretty grey and wet here this week but I managed to get a sunny picture yesterday morning , when the sun popped out for a few minutes.......

Yay, colourful crochet in the sun , what a happy sight!
Have a great Sunday .
Jacquie x

Al-Fresco Happiness

Hello again lovelies,
thank you so much for the kind words.They really cheered me up.
Just a quick post today. First crochet......... my first outdoor crochet of the year happened yesterday :0)......

I joined the last few squares to my "elmer"baby blanket sitting in the garden,enjoying the warm sun and the birdsong . I'm starting the edge tonight so hopefully there will be a ta-dah pretty soon :0)

Next spring . Did you know how much I love spring?! I spotted this scene yesterday and had to capture it to share here.......

Ahhhhh spring :0)

Lastly a little link. Has anybody seen this wonderful Al-Fresco knitting on the news ? Thanks for telling me about it Mum .Love it !!! and what a gorgeous looking place too.

have a great week
Jacquie x

Springtime ?

Hello Lovelies ,
 how do you define the changing seasons ?
 I've always followed the traditional calendar dates,  with the first day of spring being classed as the day of the spring equinox. According to this definition spring begins in the northern hemisphere on the 20th of March this year.

 These days however, I prefer to follow the Met Offices definition of the seasons ........ begining at the start of the month ... spring is March, April,May .... Summer June,July,August .... and so on.It just seems make more sense that the whole of cold ,dark December is winter. And March, when the lambs are in the fields and it's light by 6.30 am, is spring.

It certainly felt like spring here this weekend .I was so glad. After a week that included the very sad funeral of a  lovely friend and work colleague  some warm  sunshine was very welcome to help lift the spirits.
 I was tempted into the garden for the first time this year. Time for some much needed tidying . This border was a real mess...

After some removal of last years dead foliage ( me) and weeding (Mr BM )  it now looks a lot neater......

O.K. it's not much to look at yet but there are lots of little green shoots promising floral goodness to come . It felt so good to do the first gardening of the year.

 Instead of dashing inside afterwards  I was happy to spend some quiet time noticing the few spring plants we have already in flower, like these pretty white bells........

And a gorgeous hellebore.......

They are pretty small so you could easily miss them. Some tiny creatures were also enjoying the suns heat........

This may look like a big daffodil but it's just a little Narsissi ,tete-a-tete ( splashed with soil in last weeks heavy rain ) ........

you have to bend down to appreciate these , I love taking pictures from below......... a snails eye view.......

Yes, it certainly felt like spring this weekend and as I was  pottering in the garden I was reminded of this simple childrens rhyme......

Spring is showery,flowery,bowery

Summer is hoppy,croppy,poppy

Autumn is slippy,drippy,nippy

Winter is breezy,sneezy,freezy. 

I've had quite enough of breezy,sneezy,freezy .Roll on flowery and bowery (with the odd shower )

But whatever the season ,this week more than ever,I'm so thankful for my health and the health of my family .
Hope you have had an enjoyable weekend.
Jacquie x

Trying Again

Hello Lovelies,
you know me , as soon as one project is completed I need something new to work on . Crochet is my relaxation. At the end of a busy day  a simple pattern is what I need , something that does not require much concentration .
So I'm back to granny squares......they are so versatile and I never seem to tire of them. I'm trying again to make a baby blanket with small solid coloured squares like Heather's wonderful creation.  So I stuffed my project bag with yummy Stylecraft colours..........

And began. For ease I've reverted to a favourite joining method......join as you go ............and I'm loving the result..........

Here's a close up.........

Yes , I love how this project is coming along :0)
 I'm carrying my faithful old project bag with me as I move from room to room..........

Making a couple of squares while dinner is cooking , a couple more while I supervise home work . They are so quick and easy , the only downside I can think of is that there are no piles of cute granny squares to photograph and admire .

I've made 36 squares so far, now I'm sewing in the ends before adding more..........

So this blanket is going to be much closer to Heather's version , though still a little different . It will be for sale at some stage . Maybe other items would be easier to sell , and I will make other things , but right now baby blankets are giving me a lot of pleasure so I'm sticking with them.

Have a great weekend.
Jacquie x