Ooo I’m SO excited to be part of the Worldwide Artist Blog Hop!!!  

I was nominated by my lovely friend Michelle over at From Home who is a fabulous crochet designer.  You need to check out her blog; she has some fab posts of things to do with children (I love the snow dough!) and she has some awesome free patterns (her Paw Pal mittens are on my to do list!).

Right then on, with the Blog Hop stuff.  So the way this works is for each nominated blogger to answer 4 simple questions about themselves and then nominate 2 or 3 other bloggers. My nominations are at the bottom of this post but first a little bit of information about me…

Why do I do what I do?

I honestly LOVE crochet! Not to sound trite but it really has been a life saver at times – you just can’t beat yarn therapy!   It was after I finished my degree (in Literature) that I decided I would like, and now had the time, to take up a hobby (beside reading). My Nana and mum taught me to crochet when I was young and at the time I was pregnant so I decided I would try and make a blanket and that was it…I was completely hooked!  Before I knew what had happened my hobby had turned in to a little business and I started designing my own patterns.  Two years later I still can’t believe how far down the crochet road I’ve travelled since I first picked up a hook again.  But that is what I love about crochet; there is ALWAYS something new to learn, a new stitch, a new hook to try, a new yarn, a new pattern – how can anyone ever get bored!

How does my work differ from others of its genre?

Ooo this is a tough question.  I try to be unique in what I do and wouldn’t say I have a set type of item that I crochet – I’ll have a go at anything!  I’d be really interesting to me to know if people thought I had a distinctive style – would you know it was one of my designs by looking at it?

I suppose the one thing I have tried to carve a little niche for myself is by designing afghan squares which I love to do!  I design a lot for children as I have my very own inspiration walking around in my home – she really does want everything I make!  I also love colour so most of my designs are bright and bold, and I love setting myself challenges to learn new stitches or new techniques that often then morph into a new design.

How does my creative process work?

It could be anything; sometimes its an idea I have for something that just pops into my head, or a custom order that prompts a design or sometimes it’s to do with a specific need at the time.  Some of my favourite and most successful designs have been created by a customer asking ‘could you make’ and then I go away and sketch and play with yarn and hey presto!

I’m a doodler and I have hundreds of scraps of paper and books around the house that I sketch on and makes notes in all the time though I bet half of these patterns will never be made.  There are times though when the sketch isn’t enough and I can’t think about anything else and HAVE to make the design.  These are seriously the best patterns as they seem to leap off the hook and almost make themselves!

What am I working on now?

As it’s nearly Christmas I am working on a lot of orders right now – I love the idea of being Santa’s little helper!  I still have quite a few to go so that’s going to take up the majority my time in the coming weeks.

Any free time I have also been busy getting patterns written up and off to testers.  Including this little fellow, my Shelf Reindeer and a companion for my Christmas Shelf Elf; Mrs Elf! Both these patterns are being tested now and will hopefully join my ‘Shelf’ amigurumi patterns soon.

Okay now it’s nomination time!

I am going to nominate TWO blogs to participate:

1. The Whole Knit and Caboodle http://thewholeknitandcaboodle.com/ – I’ve just finished another of her amigurumi designs recently – I LOVE her patterns!
2. On the Hook Boutique: http://onthehookboutique.net/ – her tips on using PicMonkey are really great!

Head over to check out there blogs and leave them a comment to say hi!

I’d love to hear what you thought about my mini interview for the Worldwide Artist Blog Hop so please leave me a comment below and if you want to check out more artists participating in the hop then just type Worldwide Artist Blog Hop into Google.