Hi all sorry I have been a bit tardy of late and not written anything for a couple of weeks, AWOL in other words! This is due to my last born coming off his motorbike, hit by a third party who wasn’t paying attention, and breaking his left ankle and having quite a few breaks in his right foot. He is recovering well but wearing two pressure boots, one on each leg, and using crutches to get around! We are currently wading through a multitude of forms for insurance, personal injury and the police. We are so fortunate as it could’ve been a whole lot worse.

As you can imagine it has been a stressful couple of weeks and crochet has taken a bit of a back seat.

Now talking about stressful, for those of you who read my last blog I’m sure you will remember (with some heavy hints from me!) I wrote about colour and particularly the colour pink and its meaning well suffice to say although I’m continuing with a filet crochet blanket in pink. It has not had a calming effect, and as I wrote previously, has in fact has caused some agitation as I continue with the blanket. I am a little disappointed with the colour and yarn. I feel the colour is too bright and the yarn not how I expected it to be. Fortunately this is a practice piece as I haven’t made anything this size in filet crochet before but I now know I would definitely prefer to make the blanket in a cotton mix or wool next time. I’m looking forward to receiving orders for this cute little blanket soon but made in cotton or wool.

If anyone is interested at looking at my work with a thought to ordering something please pop to my Insta page:  the_crocheted_yarn or find me on Facebook: The Crocheted Yarn.  You will find items for sale or if you’d like to order a commission please email me.

So a little bit of news, this week I have applied to have a stall at a local craft fair- I’m hoping to be accepted for October and November events. This is my first foray into presenting myself and my work so openly (scary!). I have decided that I will concentrate on Mandalas/Wall hangings, baubles and key rings. What do you think? Any suggestions gratefully received. This has obviously now opened yet another minefield as I need to get insurances in place so I am now looking at craft insurers. Another thing I need to consider is packaging, I normally make my own bags when I wrap purchased Items, not sure that this is so practical at a craft fair, which means I have to be extremely organised and make up a selection of sizes in advance! This is an area I need to give some more thought too. Also, making Christmas baubles when the sun is shining and summer is nearly here just seems wrong and that’s from someone who loves Christmas just a little…

But before the bauble making commences I must finish that PINK blanket!

Whilst out on a walk today with the OH and the dog we came across some pretty wildflowers of which I need to find the name off and some tracks –

We decided they could’ve been bear tracks but as we were in North West Kent highly unlikely so the next thought was  Gruffalo tracks! This was probably a bit silly as we all really know the Gruffalo to be a wonderful character created by Julia Donaldson. Finally, with our sensible hats on we determined them to be badger tracks – it’s the first time we’ve ever seen tracks left by any kind of animal that we could identify, so we are feeling quite impressed with ourselves.

The downside to our lovely walk was lots of horrible black flies hovering around with what looked like a hook hanging below; needless to say I did the funny fly dance, moaned a little and actually ran a little to get away from the horrid beasts, never a good look! Fortunately it was just us at the time so no real embarrassment caused! I have discovered that this fly is called the St. Marks fly it is non-biting and non-stinging however, it is still scary looking and my reaction to it is still justified in my eyes.

Well I think that’s probably enough of my ramblings today so bye for now and continue to keep safe.