Love Birds

A while back I showed you the bodies I had crocheted of two little love birds. They are destined to top a friends wedding cake. Well I finished them and the wedding has been and gone (Congratulations guys!). Want to see how a few details can transform a basic shape??

So what is needed?? A beak and eyes? Wings? definitely some accessories! Here they are the finished pair

The wings of the bride however divided opinion. I liked the heart yo-yo made from the bridesmaid fabric, my sister who got a sneak peak preferred the simpler grooms wings…only one thing for it…ask the bride!!

Here’s a look at the original wings. A mauve heart yo-yo backed with some pewter net.

The bride preferred the simpler version too. So the yo-yo wings were snipped off. Even better she had a few more fabric samples. A snippet from her dress which was being altered and the embroidered net which was also part of the bridesmaid dress. I think it is the perfect combination and I am so happy with the result. What do you think?? what do you prefer?

The tiara is just some beading wire crocheted into a headband shape and then some more wire twisted with some beads into a bow shape to hopefully echo the one that the bride will wear. If I get a photo of them on top of the cake then I’ll show you!"!

OOOH !!! - Go over to Cake by Beths facebook and you can see a pic of the final cake here!!

(P.s If you are impressed by her cakes can you press the like button for her page? )

Best dressed…..cow

Yesterday we ventured out to the national trust property Bodnant Gardens. It is a lovely place full of hills and beautiful gardens. It really is worth going just to see the magnolias in bloom…things were only just starting to flower on this occasion so I think we need to plan another trip in a few weeks to get the full effect. When I looked up the postcode just before we left I noticed that it was their spring weekend and they had lots of activities, giant bubbles, pot decorating, wooden toy demos, story corner and a best dressed teddy competition. So we grabbed my son’s oldest teddy, bunged some wool and tools in a bag and we were off. A race against time to makeover Mrs Moo!

She needed a hat and apparently it just HAD to be one that allowed he ears and horns to stick out. the easiest way to do this is to start the centre and crochet until you hit your first obstacle. In this case it was a horn then do a chain that's long enough to go around the obstacle, re-join to the work and crochet on. Once you come back round you just crochet in the chain stitches. always a good idea to keep trying the hat on your victim model. To do the brim I fastened off then crocheted using longer stitches our of just the back loops of the main hat. this means that the brim will naturally fold up a bit. A ribbon and a flower later and she was done. I fastened a bit of gingham ribbon around her neck as well.

Our entry came second but we one a prize for entering!!

I’m looking forward to the days when my little man is able to help craft his own stuff for competitions but for now we have a cookie (I’m hoping he’ll share!), Mrs Moo has a new Hat and I’ll try not to think about how fast he is growing up!

Easter!

Well Easter just flew by but I have not been idle! My main task in the run up to Easter was to produce and Easter bonnet for the little ones Easter parade at nursery…..

Yes……

Everyone else said the same thing……

Easter bonnet??…….but he’s a BOY!!!

Well I wasn’t going to be the mum that let their kid miss out….there were prizes for taking part and kids love to be included so we renamed it the Easter Hat….poo pooed the sniggers and got crafting!

I decided to make a felt base for the hat and actually sketched out a plan. I was short on time you see so a plan helped keep it focussed. Want to see the sketch?

To get an idea of head size I cut a hole in an a4 sheet of paper and then popped it on his head and folded it over at the back where it was too big. I was pleased with my template but during some sporadic cleaning my husband threw the template out and kept the circle I had cut out thinking that one was the template and that my actual template was rubbish! So I winged the size. The hat based turned out ok but I had some issues at the back. There was just too much felt for a neat finish. I think this could have been solved by a) having the actual template, b) working on it when my model wasn’t snoozing in bed and c) making the top a slightly bigger size. I think practice will help. Before sewing the hat sections together I decorated the top with anything that needed to be sewn on. So the lake, the smallest ducks and the grass were all stitched in place.

I stitched some of the side details before sewing the whole hat together. The other bits were added on after as they only needed a few stitches to hold them on

The rest Came together quite easily with a few evenings of stitching and crochet. The bunny is made of a simple egg shape with ears and felt details. The duck was crocheted using the Rubber Duckie Pattern. The small ducks were just some randomly shaped crochet.

The Paper flowers were made my the little one. I popped him in the highchair and gave him a paper plate and some felt pens…admittedly there were more marks on him than the plate but the scribbles he did do added some colour to the flowers which I then cut out and meant that he had also contributed to the hat. Want to see the finished hat?

The hat is still being worn…well waved about but he definitely knows its HIS hat. He got a certificate and a small chocolate egg….oh and a rather snazzy hat