My Granny Heart Tutorial ..

Hello my dear friends,

this is my granny heart tutorial for all you lovely bloggers.

Again there are written instructions and a chart and I am hoping that one of them will work for you.
 

 How you make my granny heart ...

 

... to start off, make a magic ring and in this ring crochet the following ...

~ Round 1 ~

3 chain stitches, 2 double crochet, 3 chain stitches, 5 double crochet, 3 chain stitches, 5 double crochet, 3 chain stitches, 2 double crochet and finish this round off with one slip stitch into the top chain stitch of the beginning of this round.

 ~ Round 2 ~

Crochet a slip stitch and in the first double crochet a half crochet and in the second double crochet a double crochet. In the loop next crochet 2 treble crochets and 4 double crochets. Then in the next 5 double crochets make one double crochet each until you get to the next loop. In this loop, which is the tip of the heart crochet 1 double crochet, 1 treble crochet, 1 chain stitch, 1 treble crochet and finally 1 double crochet.

Now crochet again 1 double crochet in the next 5 double crochets and in the following loop 4 double crochets and after that 2 treble crochets. Next crochet a double crochet in the stitch before last and in the final stitch crochet a half crochet.

Finish the round of with a slip stitch in the top double crochet from the first round.

I hope my instructions make sense, but if you have any questions please feel free to e-mail me!

Enjoy making my little granny heart!


I hope you are well my dear friends and life is treating you kind.

Have a peaceful and creative day,
your


Karen B.
 

Trying To Get Back To Normal ..

Hello my dear friends,

I am slowly trying to get back to normal again with Todolwen. I never would have thought that it would be something I would find difficult just over a week ago but it is a little. I think I am just still in shock over what happened.
One thing I forgot to mention is that I now have a Pinterest page too so you can follow me on there if you wish. It is ...

... 'Todolwen by Karen B.'.
 

 I don't have too many pins just yet but that will change fast.

If you would like to follow it, just click on the little icon button on my right sidebar and you can see all the things I like. My bloglovin' and facebook button are located there too.


I was asked to explain what I exactly did to make things go wrong so I will try and do so.

I changed my URL which is the web address to your blog (www....) and the link every follower has saved. I had added a few new words to my old URL/link and now I realize (and only now), that because it was changed nobody could find me anymore, which meant that my follower button had stopped working and that I had lost all of my lovely bloggers and they had lost me. The worst thing about it is that once it is done there is no going back!

So what ever you want to do ... if it involves something with changing things in your blog settings ... ask someone like Karen Valentine for advice before you do so. I thought I had read enough information and look what happened to my blog.

Also ....

... I am adding my granny heart tutorial now to my tutorial page tomorrow for all of you lovely bloggers to use.

 Thank you to all of you that took the time to e-mail me and ask for the pattern ~ you were all so sweet and kind for doing so.

I hope you are well and life is treating you kind my dear friends.

Have a peaceful and creative day,
your

Karen B.

I Am Back And So Happy About It!!

Hello my dear friends,

Have I got a story to tell all of you and I hope that many of you will read this.

Where should I start ... maybe at the beginning.

My blog wasn't under maintenance but it was almost gone ... lost!

Some days ago I was working on my blog and thought that I would like to change a few things about it, including the URL. I went onto blogger and read up on how to do so. There were no warnings really about what could happen if you do so and so I did. I thought I knew enough to do something like this.

Little did I know ...

 ... not even a minute later I already regretted my decision but  ... it was too late!

 I lost all my followers ... all 1138 of you lovely bloggers and all my followers on bloglovin' too.
 My blog Todolwen as it was known to everybody wasn't there anymore. Need I tell you  that I cried ... a lot!! I did.

I had no idea what to do. I tried to get in touch with 'blogger help' and that didn't work. You actually can not get a person to talk to you to help you. More tears and then I made a phone call to my blog saviour ... Karen Valentine. Crying over the phone I left a message about what happened and if she could get back to me which she did almost right away. She was so sweet and tried to calm me down, which took a little while and then told me what I could do or rather what she could do to help me fix things because once you change your URL that is it ~ you can't go back, it is done!

It took my a few days to figure out what I wanted to do, rethinking things over that Karen had said to me and then making the decisions. I really don't know why it took me days because in the end it was easy. I think I was just very worried to mess things up again.

But ...

... I am back now again!

And SO happy about it!

A few little things have changed too. Now my free tutorials can be found on their very own page.
Just click on the tutorial tab and it will take you right to the page where you will them all.

My wish now is that all of you lovely bloggers will find me again and once again follow me.

If you don't mind I would love a huge favour. If you don't mind, would you spread the word in blogland of where I can be found now. It would be so sweet of all of you and I would be so grateful.

And one last thing ...

 ... I would advise all of you, if you every want to change anything on your blog settings  ... DON'T!

And ask someone who knows exactly what they are doing first ... never just hit click like I did.

It will save you a lot of heartache, believe me.

I would like to say 'Thank you' to Karen Valentine for rescuing Todolwen for me ~ I love you for this!

I would also thank my friends Dawn, from The Feathered Nest and Vicki, from 2 Bags Full for having a shoulder to cry on and for letting you know that I would be back.

And last thank you to my daughter Ashleigh who has helped me so much to these past days and always.

Lastly I would like to thank all my lost followers, that will hopefully find me again, for being so sweet and kind to me over the past almost 3 years ~ I can't wait to see all your names back here on my sidebar.

 

 

I am going to leave this post up for a while so more can understand what happened to Todolwen.
 I will start to blog properly soon again.

I hope you are well my dear friends and life is treating you kind.

Have a peaceful and creative day,

Many hugs,
yours,
 

Karen B. 

My Daughter's Wedding ~ Part One ..

Hello my dear friends,

at last ... today I would like to share the first part of my daughter Ashleigh getting married.
I wanted to do this weeks ago but I wouldn't have had any photos to share with you.

It happened almost 2 months ago ~ to be exact on 23rd of September.

 

 There were two parts to this lovely day ... 

 

 ... first came the 'official' wedding part, which was at the town hall in the morning at about 10 am. It was just four of us, my daughter and her fiancé and the two moms. The whole thing lasted about 15 minutes and was a lot of fun with giggling and joking around but still my heart stopped for that very short moment when the both of them gave each others their 'I do'. Looking at my daughter as she stood there in her flip flops and sweatshirt that had the word 'LOVE'  beaming off it, I then realized that my baby girl was really all grown up now and of how proud I was of the wonderful person she had become.

 

Afterwards I took a few photos outside for mine and her memory book and then it was back home to continue with the preparations for the second part of the day ... the 'dream' part of the wedding.
 

Many, many photos were taken, unfortunately only a few by me before things got going because I was so busy for the rest of the day. You see, I was trying to be the little elf in my daughters wedding. When ever she needed help I tried to be there for her. My daughter planned her wedding and organized everything all on her own and she did such an amazing job ... it was so beautiful! That morning I was up at 5.30 am and the next time I closed my eyes it was the next morning around 3 am. I was exhausted but one thing I can tell you ... I wouldn't miss a second of it for anything in this world!

 

Like I said many, many photos were taken and I will share them with you once we have received them from the amazing photographer's that took them.

 

But I will share a few of my photo from the 'first part' of the day ...

A single beautiful rose was the flower for this ceremony from her new mother-in-law.

 

I just loved the silliness in the morning and it was just perfect that way!

 

I did manage take a about 4 or 5 photos before there was no more time for me to do so.

So ... here is a tiny sneak peak of where the ceremony was held.

 

Isn't it beautiful?

This is the lawn of the Elsie Perrin Williams Estate. There is such a lovely story behind this place that I am going to share in a special post on it's own in the near future.

We were so lucky because the two days before the wedding it had rained a lot and we had worried it would be too wet outside but it wasn't. HE made the sun shine bright just for my baby's special day!
Thank you God!

I am not sure when we will receive all the wedding photos but it should be vey soon now because I can't wait to share with all of you so much! But we have received 'teaser' photos a few days ago so in the next few days I will be sharing part two of this post.

It would be nice for you to visit me sometime here at Todolwen again and until then ...

I hope you are well and life is treating you kind.

Have a peaceful and creative day,


Karen B.
 

Another Little Christmas Finding ..

Hello my dear friend,

yes ... I did it again. I visited my favourite store again and found another little Christmas treasure that ended up coming home with me and this one was perfect in each and every way too!

It was this small cloche with a little Christmas tree.

 

 

t is just so neat and pretty as it is and no need for me to 'make it my own' this time.

 

I am sure I will be going back there some time soon again and I am almost sure that I will again have more to share with you lovely bloggers on my return from it. Have you found any neat little Christmas treasures already? ... Do share!

And last but not least a few new critter photos from a few days ago.

 

These two cute squirrels seem to love to hang out in our maple tree almost all day and relax or eat for most of the time. They were such a delight to watch.

Thank you for stopping by here at Todolwen. It is always nice when you visit me and I would love to see you here soon again.

I hope you are well and life is treating you kind.

Have a peaceful and creative day,


Karen B.

Captured By The Beauty Of Nature ..

Hello my dear friends,

over the past few days I just couldn't seem to put my camera down and stop taking pictures of outside and the changing season. As soon as I thought I had just taken the last photo of the day I saw something else. I was almost like under a magical spell by the beauty of Mother Nature!

Today I would love to share with you lovely bloggers what I saw. This post has very few words but so many photographs. The  places there were taken were the park down the road from our house and our front and backyard.

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you were able to see the beauty just like I did.

It is stunning to see the changes of the seasons and should be treasured in our hearts and minds.

 

I hope you are well and life is treating you kind my dear friends.

 

Have a peaceful and creative day,

 

 

Karen B.

 

Our Willow Tree ..

Hello my dear friends,

it is astonishing how you can get attached to 'things' in your life.

The first time I viewed our house in 2007 when it was for sale, I really liked the house but the one thing that made this house for me wasn't inside but outside in the backyard. It was a huge willow tree that was standing very tall and proud ... almost majestic and looking oh so beautiful too.

We bought the house and the gentle green giant became ours. We loved the tree so much we even gave it a name ... 'Salisbury' after the city we lived close to in the UK, which has a large willow tree in the city center standing right next to the river Avon and the swans lived under. We we walked there so many times whilst living there.

In 2009 during a thunderstorm our willow tree was stuck by lightning which left it scared in many places and especially a huge wound all the way down the trunk. After consulting an arborist right away we were told that only time will tell us if the tree would survive.

 

 

As you can see our gentle giant towers over our house.

 

 I was just recently told that our tree might be slowly dying. The wound is too large to heal fast enough and too much damage was caused inside the willow by the powerful lightning stroke. We were advised, that to help the tree stay with us hopefully a few years longer,  the best thing would be to cut if back quite harshly to take a lot of stress of the trunk because of it's size ~ our tree is about 65 feet across and 75 feet in height so we are looking at loosing  about 30 % or maybe more of the size of her. 

I am quite sad about this and I am dreading the day the tree people will come and start to work on her. I have asked to make sure I am home so I can keep an eye on everything and it is going to be hard to see her being cut back so much but I know it's the safest and best thing for the tree and for us too. By doing this I hope our tree will be able to survive many more years because I know it will break my heart the day she has to be cut down completely which hopefully won't be for quite some time.


 A short update on my friend Heike ...

... I was able to get in touch with her husband this afternoon and she has opened her eyes!
 The doctors think that her injuries might not be as bad as first thought!
Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers and please don't just stop yet.

I would especially send my deepest heartfelt thanks to Manu in Germany.
Manu is a sweet lady who e-mailed me after reading about my worries for my friend Heike and she offered to get in touch with the hospital to find out how my friend was and let me know.

You are in my heart forever Manu ~ thank you for being such an thoughtful person.


I hope you are well and life is treating you kind.

Have a peaceful and creative day,


Karen B.

 

Your Prayers Are Needed Please ..

Hello my dear friends,

I just received a message that my oldest friend, who lives in Germany,  has been involved in a serious traffic accident. That's all I know apart from that she was on her scooter and that she is in the ER right now but nothing else.

Please keep her and her family in your thoughts and prayers!


Update:

I have just heard a little more about my friend Heike.

She was hit by a car on Monday morning whilst driving her scooter. 
She is now in intensive care and unconscious.

Your prayers are so much needed right about now!

 

Thank you so much.

 

Many hugs,

 

Karen B.



 

So Sweet And Kind ..

Hello my dear friends,

today I would like to share something that happened to me just recently but I didn't have time to share it with you until now.

A few weeks ago I received an e-mail from a sweet lady called Nancy by mistake. She did what so many of us have done before, she emailed me something that was meant for someone else. In this e-mail she wrote that she had found some lovely vintage lace that she thought I would like and she would like to send it to me.

I wrote back to her, telling her that I was touched by her kind thought but she didn't have to send me anything but that if she chose to it would be so sweet and kind. Shortly after that I received another e-mail from Nancy telling me about he mistake she made and that she felt a little bad about it. I again replied that it was OK and she needn't worry about it but she replied that she would still like to send me something little.

And that was my little story until a day last a few weeks ago when the mail man placed a large envelope into my mail box. I must admit that I had forgotten all about this until then but then reading the senders name it all came back and put a smile on my face.

Well ... my smile just kept growing as I opened the pink bow that held the green paper together and it just kept on and on! It was just like being a little kid at Christmas and that gift you didn't expect was suddenly there!

These are all the lovely treasures I found all wrapped up ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So many lovely pieces and I must say that the lace, which is Victorian, is my most favourite part of all of them.

 

 Oh dear Nancy ... you are so sweet!
 Thank you so, so much for gifting me with all those lovely treasures! It was my very own little Christmas on October 29th!

It would nice for you to pop by and visit me here at Todolwen soon again.

I hope you are well my dear friends and life is treating you kind.

Have a peaceful and creative day,


Karen B.