I know I’ve been teasing you with my visit to Toft and the pug I made for Dylan for Easter.  Both my kids are nosy, so I didn’t dare put anything up anywhere they might stumble across it before Easter Sunday.  We’re safe now, so here goes the first of two posts about impossibly cute woolly animals.

Just after Christmas my friend, Julia, and I had a bit of a road trip to the Toft Studio in Warwickshire.  We headed off on the Saturday afternoon, and after a lovely pub supper, a ridiculously early night, and a full English breakfast we didn’t have to cook ourselves, we had a crisp and sunny country drive to Toft.

The setting for the Studio is impossibly bucolic. Classic English countryside, red brick houses and a beautiful building that is home to the studio, shop, and a very warm welcome.

We did two workshops.  One amigurumi and one on stripy blankets. Both were for complete beginners, and I came away confident that although I’d never crocheted anything before I could happily complete the white rat that I’d started.  I didn’t….I poached the yarn for the wee mice I made for Summer!  But I did also purchase the yarn and pattern for Spencer the Pug for my pug mad boy.

And I did complete him.

The hardest part of this project is remembering to count!  I’m not a confident enough crocheter to try and do this and watch a film.  But it’s amazing what you can accomplish with a little quiet concentration.

Dylan is so delighted with him.  Spencer has joined Margaret, the knitted pug, as his favourite companions.

Although now, obviously, he’s not called Spencer.  A new name has yet to be decided on.  But with toy pugs already named Margaret and Phillip Reeve, who knows what we’ll end up with?!

I’m feeling decidedly accomplished and planning other projects as soon as I’ve worked through some more stash.  I can, however, highly recommend Toft workshops.  And the yarn is simply sublime!  I want to knit All The Things in it now.