Fathers Day!

Hi everyone,

As the title of this post suggests, this post is mainly about Fathers day :P However I would like to begin by saying a big thanks to Steph (see her blog here!) who sent me this lovely bundle in the post:

 

 

 

They are the most awesome cross stitch charts ever and she even put in an adorable little Hamtaro charm she found for me! (for those of you that don't know I love Hamtaro and hamsters in general :-)

 

How kind and lovely Steph is, I can't wait to start on some of the charts! Thank you xxxx

 

Hehe, now onto fathers day :P

 

First up, I managed to finish the Paddington Biscornu I was making for my dad just in time:

 

My dad loves Football

 

And he does some primary school maths teaching (Just to explain why I chose those Paddingtons, in case I haven't already)

 

I stitched the words 'I love You Dad' and a little heart into the opposite corners:

And I added two little love heart charms to make it extra special:

 



 

My dad really liked it and said it would probably take him years to sew something that didn't look nearly as good, lol :P He also thought the shape was cool.

 

Making this Biscornu has reminded how much I love the shape of them too, an dhow fun they are to make. Maybe I will whip up another couple using the charts Steph sent me.... ooohh.... a Hamtaro Biscornu.... I am in heaven!!!

But before I drift off into Biscornu world, back to fathers day. As well as his other presents me, my mum and my brother all clubbed together to buy ingredients for a special Fathers day picnic. I then did some baking with it all (with a bit of help from my brother) and voila:

 

We had to have it indoors because it wasn't very sunny outdoors, but I think it still looked pretty and we still had fun. There were benefits also like not being bothered by any insects, lol!

 

The round bread loaf you can see in the picture is actually a giants sandwich (a hollowed out loaf that you fill with your sandwich filling them slice it and eat it). I filled it with green salad leaves, roasted tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, basil and some Quorn ham- we managed to finish it all, it was tasty, even if I do say so myself :P

 

In terms of baking, I made peanut butter cookies:

 

Cherry and Cinnamon cake (the recipe for which can be found here)- which went reallllyy well with custard!:

And finally some black bottom cupcakes (chocolate and a blob of cheesecake mix, with cream cheese frosting on top) from the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook:

 



 

Everything went down well :) Pretty much everything I know about picnics, dinner parties, and cooking in general I have learnt from watching and helping my dad (and a little bit from GCSE food tech, lol) so it was nice to get to treat him by showing him all he has taught me, and by doing all the hard work he normally has to do to put everything together for him.

I LOVE YOU DAD! XXX

After the picnic we all watched a Paddington bear DVD (my present to my dad) and the Harry hill movie (one of my brothers presents to my dad), which was amusing- and one of the main characters was a hamster, lol!

 

I hope all of you had a good weekend/Fathers day too. I better go now though, I have got to get off to college in a moment to finish my jacket,

 

See you all soon,

 

Bye XxXxXxX

It's my birthday!!!

Hello,

Yes, today is officially my Birthday! :D I have had a fabulous day with my lovely family :-)

 

My Dad as usual amazed me with the birthday cake he made for me- it was so lovely to look at and to eat! (though my eyes were too big for my belly and I ate a bit too much :P)

 

Here it is in all its lovely leopard print and cute little mouse/bunny glory :D:

 

 

Isn't he adorable :3

 

Also as usual I was blown away by my family's generosity and thoughtfulness in the presents they got me because having them is a gift enough- and all the lovely stuff they got me ready for uni too- I seriously thought I might wake up and have stuff taken off me instead of getting more gifts as it seems like I have had more than my lot already!

 

Here are some pictures of my wonderful gifts- Thank you to all my lovely family and friends for all of them:

 

 

I am soo excited about reading all of these books :) I have already gained inspiration for my Halloween costume from the fashion book my friend got me :P

 

Hehe, two Kawaii fuzzy Llamas and a fluffy jacket to match- what more could a girl ask for? ;)

 

My mum got me the two little craft kits and my wonderful, lovely, brilliant brother got me the Hamtaro Bijou plush (he also got me a very cool Domo poster which I will post a picture of when it is up and the words he wrote inside my card he made for me were so lovely that they made me cry! And on top of all of that he offered to buy me a film and a Mcflurry- because I love them so much!)

 

I can now top up my chocolate stash thanks to my friends and dad (my friends also got me a pretty picture frame with a picture in it of all of us at my Halloween party dressed up- haha, it is coming to uni with to make me smile each day)

 

Some lunchboxes and luxurious bath stuff courtesy of my dad, I love the cat lunchbox as it reminds me of the Lucky Chinese cats!

 

And last but by far not least some cool Dvds and Cds. I have been wanting to watch the films for ages- mainly for all the amazing costumes in them and who doesn't love a bit of Andre Rieu? :P

 

Thank you again to my family and friends as my day would not have been so  special without you to share it with xxx

 

Hahaha, I hope all of you have had a wonderful day as well, see you all soon with more Innocent hat knitting news!

 

See you all soon,

 

Bye xxx 

Free mini Hamster cross-stitch chart! :)

Hi,

As I posted about before, I really love Hamtaro- the Japanese Hamster character (and my love has only been further enhanced by Steph sending me a lovely big cuddly hHmtaro in the post :D). I also just really like Hamsters in general too, I think they are lovely and interesting creatures. For this reason I wanted to do some hamster related crafting! I looked online for different cross stitch patterns but was surprised to find there were not that many :( The ones there were were good but not quite what I wanted so I just got out my threads box and made up this simple little design myself:

 

 

It was really fun making up the different patterns on the hamsters, I have more ideas for cute patterns and designs to try/to try them in different colours :)

 

I thought I would give the chart for the above hamsters just in case anyone wanted to stitch a few/ experiment with their own designs for the little guys :-)

 

Here it is:

You can use the picture of my finished cross stitch in the picture above for extra help/reference if needed- the diamond shapes are french knots and the dots are just normal cross stitches (use two strands of thread for all)

 

I hope you like the chart and are having a lovely weekend!

 

See you again soon,

 

Byeeeeeeeee XXxXxXxxXxxxX

Hamtaro and friends!- adorable but forgotten

Hi,

 

A while ago now I discovered the little Japanese hamster character Hamtaro (Illustrated by Ritsuko Kawai) but recently I did quite a bit more research and watched some episodes of it and found out he had a whole host of adorable friends too- and I got a bit addicted!

 

Image from: here

 

I searched on Ebay and managed to pick up this little Hamtaro Ham Ham house playset which came with tons of figures, oooh I love it :3

 

 

I was sad to find out though that Hamtaro is a bit of a forgotten character- I don't think any episodes are being made any more and pretty much all of the official Hamtaro products are not being produced anymore :(  (That's why I was so happy I managed to pick up my little house!)

 

But Hamtaro and friends are way too adorable to be forgotten!

 

As I say I got a bit addicted and..... here's the result...

 

 

Crochet hamster faces! :P They are so fun to make- I made up the pattern a couple of days ago- eventually I want to make the whole crew (so far I have only done Hamtaro, Bijou and Cappy :)

 

Hehehehe :P I'm off to make another couple now!

 

Lol, see you all soon,

 

Byeeeeeee xxxxxxxx :)