Dolphins, Martin and Knit Companion

We had supper with friends (15 of us!) at our house last night. I haven't seen my dear friend Debbie (who lives down the road from us) for a few months, so I was looking forward to catching up. Gerry, the kids and myself went into town for some basic supplies, and arrived home around 4 o'clock, which was when my Woolies groceries order was supposed to be delivered. As it turned out, the delivery arrived at 7 o'clock, with me trying to juggle kids, cooking and a slew of phone calls from the hospital...it was like being in the Twilight Zone, I swear! Thankfully Debbie chatted to some of our other guests and by the time we all sat down for supper, things were more under control. As it was such a late night, we slept late, and woke to a warm but misty ocean, calm and glassy. This is generally the weather the dolphins like, and sure enough, huge schools swam lazily by...
The dolphins are a regular feature along our bay...you can ususally see them early morning and around 4 in the afternoon. They swim quite close to the breakers, and if you are brave enough, you can either swim amongst them or paddle on your paddleski between them.

Our bay has a lot of sea life. Whales are frequently spotted, albeit further out obviously, and occasionally Killer whales are spotted as they travel up the coast.
Within an hour the mists had disappeared, giving way to a glorious calm, sunny day. Gerry went out to swim early on, and I suspect that the girls will head down as soon as the little potatoes are awake from their late night!


I received a lovely email from Tania (who lives in Russia), sharing her beautiful African Flower Bear (who she has named Martin) with me. I asked if I could post her photos to show you all how adorable the little bear turned out. I really love the colours and the sweet expression! You are so talented Tania, thank you for sharing :)

If you have made Lollo bear and would like to show some photos of your creation, post the photos on the Projects page of the Ravelry pattern. This way everyone who accesses the pattern page on Ravelry can see them :) I would love to see all of the bears you have crocheted!


I have recently discovered Knit Companion for iPad. This is an App available through iTunes, that allows you to set up and organize any PDF based knitting pattern on your iPad. It is a fantastic tool, as you don't need a paper copy at all. You can add row counters, repeats, different sections at a time of your pattern, as well as pictures, charts , lifelines and stitch markers...all on the iPad! Awesome stuff folks! So you only need your needles and yarn and your iPad and you are set to go. They have a very useful video tutorial guide on how to set up everything, so it's easy and user friendly. I cannot recommend this App highly enough :)....and No, I am not paid by them to say these things ;)
The App costs $15.99, but before you balk at the price, let me asure you that I think it is worth every cent! You can download all your Ravelry Patterns and convert them into easy to follow Knit Companion patterns....it's the best knitting App I have ever bought....

The App comes with several awesome patterns form well known designers, so you can start playing (and knitting ;) ) straight away...

Have any of you bought Knit Companion? Let me know what you think!

♥Heidi

African Flower Pentagon Tutorial

Hi everyone,
Well, I have been very pleased and thankful for all the wonderful kind comments I have received since I posted about Lollo Bear Pattern last night! Thank you to every person who commented and visited, and of course appreciation and thanks to all who bought a copy of the pattern!

One omission on my part, was to leave out a tutorial on how to crochet an African Flower Pentagon. I assumed (and we all know what that does...), that if you were familiar with the hexagon, you would be able to crochet the pentagon... I am really sorry folks! I should have done a tutorial, and so here it is.

Essentially the pentagon and hexagon are crocheted in the same way, except that you make 5 petals instead of 6. You just crochet one repeat per round less, and the stitches remain the same. That being said, I have put together a quick pictorial on crocheting the pentagon, in the hopes that it will help those crocheters who are making Lollo :) I have made one or two small modifications for ease of crocheting.

African Flower Pentagon Tutorial

Chain 5, and join to the first chain via a slip stitch (represented by the round dot). This forms your ring.

Chain 3. Dc into the center of the ring.
Chain 1.
* 2dc into the ring, chain 1, repeat from * 3 more times.

Slip stitch into the third chain to close your round. Round 1 completed.



Now Slip Stitch into the next along chain space as seen above. If you are making Lollo, now is the time to change yarn colour.

Chain 3. Dc into the same chain space. Chain 1. 2dc into same space. Moving along to the next chain space of Round 1, crochet 2dc, chain 1, 2dc. Move to the next along chain space of Round 1, and repeat the 2dc, chain1, 2dc as before. Continue crocheting around the motif, until you have reached the end of the round. Slip Stitch to the third chain to close the round. Round 2 completed.


Now slip stitch to the next along chain space. This sets your hook up for the 7dc repeats of Round 3.
Chain 3. 6dc into the same space. Move along to the next chain space along of Round 2, and crochet 7dc into that chain space. Move to the next along chain space of Round 2 and crochet 7dc as before. Continue in this way around your motif until you have reached the end of the round. Slip stitch to the third chain to close your round.
Round 3 completed.

Join a new colour yarn. Just as you would for the African Flower Hexagon, crochet 7sc (one into each consecutive stitch of Round 3), and 1LONG dc into Round 2 below. Repeat all along the motif, until you have reached the end of the round. Slip stitch into the first sc and change yarn colour. Round 4 completed.

You need to make one round more, Round 5 (which in Lollo Bear Pattern is the cream colored yarn round). Remember that when you are joining motifs for Lollo, you need to crochet Round 5 as-you-join! I have illustrated one 9dc repeat as seen above, to show you that you still end up with the correct amount of stitches for joining, even though the motif is a pentagon :)

I hope that this helps, and please send me an email if you are having difficulty with Lollo's pattern :)

Have a good evening folks!
♥Heidi

Lollo African Flower Bear Pattern is available!

Hi everyone!

I have finally finished the pattern...so here is a quick post to announce that my Lollo African Flower Bear Pattern is available in my Ravelry Store for purchase...it's been a long time overdue! I have never uploaded a pattern for sale on Ravelry, so if you do buy a copy, and there are any glitches, please let me know...it's a learning curve for me as well... :)

Here is the link:

http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/lollo-the-african-flower-bear

The cost of the pattern is $10US, and there are 6 separate PDF files to download.

I hope that you will find the pattern easy to follow and a pleasure to crochet!

Chat soon,
♥Heidi

An African Flower Surprise Pattern

Hello everyone! It's been a looooooong time since I last had the time to blog, but I have managed to write up my pattern for our newest family member...Lollo African Flower Bear!
She is named after my youngest daughter, whose nickname is Lollo. Lollo has been long in the making, with more frogging than I care to remember, and more design changes than I would like to admit.

Between work and all the rest of family life, I have worked on and off on this pattern. Before I started , I managed to speak to the original designer of the African Flower Hexagon Pattern, who graciously sent me an email with permission to use the pattern and to make up Lollo Bear and sell the pattern. Thank you very much! Lots of Lollo Love coming your way :)

I have purposely over-explained every single step of how to make Lollo. The eBook comprises almost 200 pages and has over 300 explanatory photographs, with clear legends. That being said, the eBook has been broken down into several parts, as the whole book is quite a big file.
This week, I am going to try get to grips with uploading the eBook to Ravelry! I have never submitted a multi part eBook, so wish me success with this... :) ...so keep checking back if you are interested in making a Lollo for yourself!


On other matters...it has been a very busy time in the last 6 months! We had a fabulous holiday in France, skiing in April this year :) We have also been extremely busy in the ICU, with loads of new developments. Gerry has been busy with all his ECMO work as well, and is presenting at the International ELSO Conference in September this year...I am very proud of him!

I have also turned part of my garden into an organic vegetable garden and orchard. It is Spring in South Africa and the fruit trees are blooming! I have sweet cherries, pears, peaches, mulberries, grapefruit, apples, nectarines, loads of lemons, Calamondin oranges, limes, Kumquats, pomegranates, figs, gooseberries, plums, raspberries, strawberries, grapes, Loganberries, Blackberries and am going to try and grow litchis and avocados as well (however, they will have to live in the greenhouse, as it gets way too cold here!) I will post some gardening photos and info in another post...I have learned so much about organic gardening and companion planting in the last few months :)

I have so many things I want to post about, but have run out of time, so I'll say Ciao! everyone,
have a good evening :)

♥Heidi