Snowflakes, Unicorns, and Cakes

Whew! It has been a long time since I’ve written a blog post in here! The holidays and end of the semester kept me so busy. I haven’t had too much time to be creative with my crocheting lately, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t made plans for the new year! I’ve got lots in store for you this year (well, what I have planned anyway).

During the break, my kids and I had the chance to play in snow in our own yard for a few days. It doesn’t snow often (this is the first time my kids have had a ‘real’ snow instead of just some frozen slushy icy rain) so we made the best of it!

Last week was my birthday and I decided to make my own cake this year. Now, I love to cook and I enjoy baking, but I don’t usually make decorated or fancy looking things. Think function over fashion. But this year, I decided to try my hand at decorating a cake. Now, I’ll totally fess up to scouring Pinterest for inspiration after watching one-too-many videos from Yolanda Gamp over at How To Cake It.

But I did it. I was directed to a yummy vanilla cake recipe from Rock Recipes. And a simple homemade vanilla buttercream frosting recipe. I used fondant for the first time as well. Anyway, here’s my first attempt at making a decorated cake. I present my Unicorn Pinata cake:

Not too bad for my first attempt. It’s not perfect, but I was pretty happy with the outcome. And, I’m not much for cake (though, I do love a good buttercream frosting), but this cake recipe was really good and I actually ate some of it! My kids loved seeing the sprinkles spill out when we cut into the cake. As for the rest of the cake, I sliced it up, wrapped up each piece in some saran wrap, and stuck them in the freezer for an attack of the sweet tooth. Makes it so we won’t eat the entire cake at once and saves some for later!

Another Unicorn Lovey in the Books

After making my first African Flower Unicorn Lovey, I was itching to make another one. So when my cousin’s due date approached, I was more than happy to start another unicorn lovey. I got her mom (my auntie) to send me this adorable photo of her soon-to-be-born baby girl’s nursery so I could pick out some colors to go with the theme. And let me tell you, I’ve never had such a difficult time picking out colors. I even went as far as to ask my favorite Facebook crochet group for suggestions.

I finally settled on a color combo that I was more than pleased with. Isn’t the combo lovely?

I used the same techniques as I did on my previous African Flower Unicorn Lovey, with the exception of my joining method. This time around, I got smart, and did the join-as-you-go method. Here’s the link to Heidi Bears’ great tutorial on how I accomplished this. She also has a video for those of you who are more into video tutorials. The only thing I did differently, was join in EVERY stitch, rather than just the few times she instructs you to. I wanted it sturdy since this is a lovey.

I used my favorite yarn–I Love This Yarn by Hobby Lobby for its soft and workable qualities. My colors for this project included: Menthe, Ocean, Soft Pink, Pink, White, Greybeard, and Yellow for the horn.

Love this one. The colors worked out perfect.

Flowered Unicorn

Social media can be so awesome. I like being able to keep in touch with my friends and family that live so far away. It’s also really neat to be able to connect with people from my youth. An old friend of mine from my childhood that I grew up ice skating with had a daring little girl about a year ago, and I’ve enjoyed seeing all of her daughter’s awesome photos and funny little antics over the last year…thanks to social media. So, naturally, I was excited when my friend asked me to make a stuffed unicorn for her daughter.

The pattern is an easy work-up. The hair and tail are the pieces that take the most time. I went with my favorite yarn–I Love This Yarn by Hobby Lobby in Menthe, Mango, White, and Yellow. It’s such a soft yarn that’s both wonderful to work and snuggle with. The unicorn pattern is by the creator of One Dog Woof. The tail was made with 9 curls (3 of each color) by chaining 30+3 HDC in each chain.

My only alterations this time around included yarn eyes instead of safety eyes and a different color change. This was my first time using this color change and let me tell you, I love the result. As you can see, the color change here results in a nice solid line of color change, rather than the typical jagged edge.

The flower on the ear of the unicorn was the only request made by my friend other than the yarn eyes. I really think the flower finishes this unicorn’s look.

I recently hit my one year mark since learning how to crochet, and it was so fitting to make this unicorn because this is the same unicorn pattern I used one year ago for my very first crochet project. It’s a fun project that’s great for both beginners and those with some practice under their belt. Hope you love it Audrey!

Baby on the way!

No, not my baby. I’ve been there, and done that. But a new little niece of mine should be here any day now. One of my younger brothers is about to be a daddy for the very first time, so of course,  I had to whip my brother and sister in law a few baby items.

The secretness of this project has kept my Facebook and Instagram account pretty quiet lately, and I’m so excited to FINALLY be able to share it with you. I’m not gonna lie, this whole gift makes me all giddy and kinda wish I had a baby on the way.

Don’t you just love it?! Details on the patterns I used are found below. The color scheme was pulled from the baby’s nursery. The vibrant coral and turquoise pair perfectly with the dark grey and crisp white. What a fun color scheme for a nursery! I used my go-to yarn line, Hobby Lobby‘s ‘I Love This Yarn’ in Greybeard, White, Mango, and Turquoise (all worsted weight).

The striped baby blanket is a pattern by The Felted Button found here. Since this was meant for a baby,  I altered the pattern just a bit to make it smaller. But isn’t that a gorgeous pattern? I have plans to make one that will stay in my house.

These teeny little sandals are by TMK Crochet found here. I used a different bow pattern, but I have no idea where I found it nor do I remember how I did it (of course, right?).  The headband is AWESOME. If you are familiar with crocheted headbands, you know they stretch (or don’t stretch) kinda funny so their fit is a bit off. Well, fear no more, I found an easy, adjustable, and perfect headband by The Lovely Crow rightly called ‘The Genius Headband’ found here. Seriously, this headband IS magical. And the flower I used is by Autumn Berry Crochet and can be found here.

Now for my favorite part of this whole package–the unicorn lovey. You may have noticed that I tend to mix-and-match various patterns to come up with what I make. I first saw an African Flower Hippo lovey made by the talented Amy over at Spicy Tuesday Crafts and knew I HAD to make a lovey using the African Flower motif as the blanket base. It’s just that colorful and fun.

I used a random African Flower pattern from the internet (just Google ‘African Flower pattern’ and you’ll find a TON of them) for the base and joined them in a layout that suited my needs. The unicorn head and arms are from One and Two Company‘s Nuru the Unicorn pattern found here. In order to achieve the right scale, I had to go up a hook size or two on the unicorn. The head was made as the pattern states, with a different type of hair because of my own personal preference. I chose to make the arms longer than the pattern stated, again to achieve the right scale. I added a bow over her ear to fancy her up a bit :)

Now, to wait for another little baby on the way because I really really want to make another unicorn lovey!

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