Thank you mamas!

At my send off in February I was so surprised at the generosity of my wonderful mama friends - I received a rather large gift voucher to a yarn store in London! It's taken me a while to actually get to the store All the fun of the Fair (ATFOTF) but yesterday it was right near my dentist so I had to pop in.

I have to confess that yarn stores in the UK are nothing like the US. I'm really disappointed in general. Not at ATFOTF mind you - the lady who runs it is just lovely, they have a smallish range but make up for it with heart. I was just so spoilt with yarn.com, The Point (RIP) and all the other yarn stores I could click and shop or visit frequently.

It saddens me that I have all these ideas for projects and I can't knit/crochet them because I just can't get the yarns here. What am I going to do? I'll probably end up ordering from the US and paying the extraordinary shipping and duties.

However, I did see some beautiful yarns at ATFOTF and just need to plan some projects around the yarn rather than the other way around. I didn't walk away empty handed though. I saw this lovely Baby Doll Dress while searching for a crochet blanket/throw type pattern on Sunday night and thought it will be a great post baby dress - the top should be stretchy enough to pull down for feeds (or I'll put some buttons in it) and it's nice and forgiving around the tummy area for the few months it takes to get my belly down. I'll just get a nice slip to wear under it.

Although I have so many grey things and it makes me look like a dishrag, it's such an easy colour to accessorise and hopefully won't show up the dirt like a lighter colour - or puke for that matter. It will look fabulous with one of my many red pairs of shoes and a great scarf. I might even thread a red ribbon through the bodice. We'll see.

I started it today and am hoping that it's a quick crochet. I'll certainly show you the finished result but I probably won't be able to model it personally for a while - I'm HUGE!

Thanks again mamas and you really are missed...