Babies and Presents

There seems to have been a bit of a baby-explosion within our circle of friends recently. I've been knocked out a bit by a viral infection, so have been making various presents as it doesn't require too much energy at one time!

So far, I've been working on a cross stitch and two cushions for the newborns, and also a present for hubby's cousin, who's just turned four (better late than never!)

I decided to try out some letters that I've been after on Ebay for a while, and this was a good excuse! This tutorial on the Felt Sew Good blog, and the Hobbycraft Ideas Library notes on a similar design (here) were really useful for helping me figure out how I wanted her present to look. The plan is to make five hearts, two as bookends, and three in the middle with her initials on. I'm adding ribbon to the top of each so that they can be hung up together in her room.

Progress so far:
Felt (from the_felt_fairy on Ebay, which is really good quality) has all been cut to size, using heart shaped templates that I printed from Google:

I've started the darker purple hearts that I'm planning on putting on each end of the chain:

These are the letters to spell out her initials:

Hopefully she'll like it  - this is the first time I've tried anything like this, and even had to learn how to do blanket stitch too (the guide here was excellent)!


Edit: the finished article!