I decided to make crochet heats using my Simple Christmas Heart pattern which you can download and print off for free here. I roped in some of the yarners from my knitting group and so hopefully when we meet tomorrow we’ll have a good haul of hearts with which we can love-bomb Hampshire…

I have also been busy in the kitchen. Small girl has been ill all week so I have had more time at home than expected and less time to work. I spotted this gorgeous silicone heart baking mould free (ahem… minus the exorbitant magazine price) with a copy of something called Baked and Delicious.

Big girl (the germ-free one) and I baked a batch of cakes in the silicone and we decided to make Valentine’s cakes with the large size hearts and cake pops for the sale at small girl’s pre-school with the small hearts.

Big girl doesn’t like icing so her version of a cake-pop is this:

A lolly stick stuck in a cake. Works for her.

However, for the sale we made some the traditional way. If you don’t know how it’s dead easy. Crumb the baked cakes, mix with butter icing and stick back in the mould to shape. Put the whole thing in the fridge for 20 minutes or so until they are firm. Melt some chocolate and dip the lolly sticks in the melted chocolate before pushing them into the cake pop. When the chocolate has set, dip the whole thing in pink melted chocolate (white chocolate mixed with a few red candy melts) and then into sprinkles.

You’ll need one of these super-high-tech cake pop stands to hold them until they’re dry. Fill an empty cereal box with rice and tape up. Poke holes into it for your lolly sticks and stand back and admire your handiwork.

With the large cakes we simply covered them in ready-to-roll icing and piped various designs on.  You could of course just bake a tray of sponge and use a heart cutter to cut out little heart shapes

And of course there were other crafty goings on for Valentine’s day…

This is not my idea, I had seen it on Pinterest a while ago and on returning to search for it, I have found many different variations. So, while I can’t claim it was my idea, I also can’t credit it to anyone else either. A couple of them are here and here if you would like to check them out.

Actually, I’ve just realised what terrible photos these are, but I took them using my phone whilst we were in the midst of our creative flow, so you’ll have to forgive us.

We used air-drying clay so we didn’t have to bake them. Make sure you get white clay though, or Santa will have a grubby beard! We rolled out the clay to about 6 mm thickness first and the girls pressed their hands in. I actually had to press over the top of their hands to get a decent print as the clay was quite tough. I didn’t think to take photos of that bit but I’m sure you get the idea.

Next we made a hole to hang it using a thick drinking straw. I cut around the girls’ handprints with a knife and we left it to dry over night.

There was a fair amount of clay left over from the packet so we used play-doh cutters to make little shaped ornaments and made holes again with straws.

The following morning we painted the handprints, using a picture as a guide. We used Ceramica porcelain paint and it dried all lovely and shiny. I just used a permanent marker for the black details which worked a lot better than the ceramic paint outliner I had bought.

Although the girls did a lot of the painting (under heavy direction), I put the features on myself as I didn’t want all our hard work to end up as a big splodge. I was a little control-freak-mummy over this but the girls were given completely free rein to decorate the little cookie-cutter ornaments we made from the left over clay in their own style.

I then wrote ‘Christmas 2012′ on the back using the same black permanent marker that I used for the face.

I appreciate it’s a little late to be inspiration for the Christmas just gone, but it’s never too early to start getting ready for Christmas next year!

Tah dah!

Its made in 4 Ply cotton so it’s really a summery ‘over-a-vest-or-bikini’ type thing. So not really for now unless you live somewhere particularly tropical. It’s meant to be a subtle skull pattern, so at first glance you don’t really notice it. You could actually make some really punked-up net curtains with the design if you were so inclined

I’m hoping to have the pattern up on the website soon but at the moment it’s in the capable hands of the lovely Ann who is testing it for me. She’s got her work cut out as I write patterns the same way as I speak (or write): it all comes out in a rush and  it’s probably really only me who knows what I’m going on about. Don’t worry, I promise I’ll have it under control by the time I make it generally available.

Anyway, this is just a quickie post as I wanted to get it in to the F.O. Fridays (Finished Object Fridays) link-up that Tami runs from her blog.

Check it out because she has made herself a really very cool Doctor Who e-reader case. I am actually a little bit covetous of this as I’m a massive Doctor Who fan. There’s loads of other links to beautiful and creative things people have made too so pop over and have a look.

However, I have decided to plod on regardless.

Christmas and New Year were pretty magical here thanks to the two smalls who were completely awed by all the wonderful lights, visits to Father Christmas and the many other special Christmas goings-on.

I very nearly completed my mission to give only handmade (by myself or other people) gifts this year. I will gradually get around to sharing some of the things I (and the children) made that I couldn’t show before Christmas for fear of spoiling the surprise.

I say, nearly completed as, towards the eleventh hour, caught up in the madness of preparations for Christmas, teaching 3 or 4 days a week, proof-reading my book, performing in 2 plays and of course looking after a 2 year old and a 4 year old, I something of an epiphany….

I am NOT in fact, Superwoman.

I know, it’s as much of a surprise to me as it was to you. There I was doing a million different things, constantly apologising to people I was letting down, doing half a job on everything when I realised that the people I was letting down the most were the very people who are the most important.

So this year I have just made one resolution: to do less, better.

And this best of all…

However, in this momentary hiatus between the school run and going off to teach myself, I have finally found a moment to share a little last-minute project.

About three or so years ago I downloaded a pattern for a knitted poppy from the Royal British Legion website. I hadn’t even opened it, but had been intending to make at least one, or maybe some to sell to raise money for the RBL. I thought it would be a lovely activity for the ladies (we still live in hope that some men will join us…) of  the ‘Good Yarn’ crochet and knit group. However, when I opened the pattern I have to confess I was a little disappointed with it. It didn’t look as, well, as beautiful as I had hoped. It’s here if you want a look.

But the internet is a pretty wonderful thing and before I knew it I had a screenful of options. My favourite is this gorgeous knitted field poppy.

I was keen to have a crochet version too and found this really good one if you want a traditional remembrance poppy:

However, what I couldn’t find was a free pattern for a realistic-looking poppy, so I based the look on the gorgeous knitted field poppy above and wrote a quick pattern to make it in crochet. I’ll add it to the pattern page when I can, but it’s so simple it’ll fit nicely into a blog post. I should add of course that while it’s free and I’m happy for you to print it, share it, make loads to sell etc, don’t forget to give a donation to The Royal British Legion for each one. Click here to make a donation.

So in a ludicrously self-indulgent blog post I am allowing myself a small moment of pure excited joy for the book in its actual realness.

I am expecting some sort of karmic retribution for this ridiculously self-promoting behaviour and fully expect to be walking around with my skirt caught up in my knickers for the rest of the day…

So there it is, in all its lovely bookiness.  Very satisfying.

I appreciate after all that carry on, you probably want to give me a swift slap and tell me to get over myself; but if you’re one of those lovely people who are just pleased for me, I would be every so grateful if you could Pin it, Facebook it or Tweet it. Thank you so much lovelies

So while the Work-In-Progress crochet mesh top (so suitable for this weather) remains a W-I-P, I have still been thinking of quick patterns for my lovely ladies of ‘A Good Yarn @ The Bridge’ – my Friday morning knitting/ crochet class.

I can’t in fact take any credit for this idea, as it was one I swiped from the lovely Jen at Beaker Button, but I whipped up a super simple pattern for my ladies which I will put on my patterns page as soon as I can.

It’s so simple though, that I can tell you here and now. You could have made a pair by tonight if you leave that pile of laundry and sit down and start knitting instead….

For the top:

Using 6mm needles, cast on 32 st (or as many as you need to fit comfortably around your hand just above the thumb.) But you must have a multiple of 4 st (28, 32, 36 etc) otherwise the ribbed pattern below will not work.

Work in garter st (knit each row) until it measures 8 cm or as long as you need (the measurement between the bottom of your little finger and your wrist.)

After you have worked a few rows, just check it’s about the right size to fit around your hand. You may need to start again if it looks too big or small. Just remember to remove or add groups of 4 stitches.

For the rib:

Change to 5mm needles and work in 2 x 3 rib as follows:

{K2, P2} repeat to end.

Repeat this row until the ribbed part measures 8 cm or as long as you would like.

To make up:

Fold the wrist warmer in half lengthways and sew the edges together as follows:

Sew 2cm down from the cast on edge. Leave a gap of 4cm for your thumb. Sew the last 2cm of the garter stitch section and all of the ribbed section.

You will need to adjust these measurements if you made the garter stitch section longer or shorter.

There. Told you it was simple.

However, I do know this: If you want to make anything, especially presents, in time for Christmas, you need to start early. Many, many times I have been up all hours trying to finish off some little project that just HAS to be finished by morning. Of course, I can’t let you see the presents I’m making at the moment in case the intended recipient happens upon my blog, but I’ll try and show you how many I actually managed to finish after Christmas…

What I can show you is the super simple Christmas Ornament crochet patterns I have made for my lovely ladies who come along every week to A Good Yarn at The Bridge. This is a knitting and crochet group I run at a local cafe. It’s very child-friendly, which is a good thing as my little girl comes with me. Most of the ladies are new to crochet so quick little projects like this are relatively simple to make. They only use double and treble (US single and double) crochet so once you’ve mastered these two stitches, you’re away.

I’ve also made a pattern for a little candy cane ornament which is all made from beads. It takes a bit of preparation to thread all the beads on the cotton before you start, but its very simple to make and I think the finished look is worth the effort!

All these patterns will be available as free downloads just as soon as my technical team (my mate Laura) is able to put them up on the website. If you like my facebook page, or follow me on twitter then I’ll let you know as soon as they’re up!

I am dying to see what everyone else is making for Christmas, so please leave a comment or a link if you’re up to something!

Catherine x

At the time when the contestants were baking incredible cakes with designs baked into the sponge, visible only when you cut into it, I happened to also receive an email from Cake Central who had a tutorial on how to bake a leopard print sponge.  So, being blessed with over-confidence in the craft department, I decided to give it a whirl.

It’s a bit of a fiddle as the ‘spots’ are basically light brown cake pops, covered with a layer of dark brown cake pop mixture, which are then placed in a normal cake batter before baking.

If you have never made cake pops, they’re dead simple but a bit of a faff as you need to make and bake sponge cakes first. You then crumble the baked sponge with your fingers until it resembles breadcrumbs.

I did this with chocolate sponge for the dark colour and plain vanilla for the light brown. Then mix the crumb mix with frosting (I cheated and used ready-made) until you can form it into balls.

I mixed the plain sponge with chocolate frosting to get the light brown shade. Then made about a million small cake pop balls. They only need to be an inch or so in diameter, and in fact would look better if they weren’t properly round.

Then cover all these little balls in a layer of chocolate cake pop mix (chocolate cake crumbs mixed with chocolate frosting).

Make a vanilla sponge in the usual way (or if you don’t know, there’s a recipe here). Then pop all the cake pop balls in. I had some light brown balls left over after I ran out of dark brown mix, so I put those in too! Fit in as many as you can, but make sure they are completely covered by the uncooked cake batter. I was worried about the cake pops being cooked twice but actually they don’t taste dry or overcooked at all. In fact I think this was one of the tastiest cakes I’ve ever made (if I do say so myself… !)

When the cake is cut, the leopard print design is revealed… Ta dah!

I made this into a handbag cake for my mother in law’s birthday, although I must admit, in terms of cake design, it was a bit of a disaster as the whole cake gradually fell back during the course of the evening. This photo was taken hastily before it fell to bits! Oops… Lucky it tasted good!