FOs! :)

I finally have some finished objects to share with you! :)

I actually completed these last week, but they were intended as gifts, and therefore had to be kept under wraps just a little bit longer...

This first one is a simple tea cozy... although I made it for 'our' teapot, I actually had Mike in mind when I was knitting it, since he works from home and is the one who uses the teapot most often...

and when he does, he tends to wrap the tea towel around the pot to keep it warm - so then when I go to use that tea towel in the evening, I can never manage to find it!

This is a great stash-busting project. I had a little more than one skein of Noro Kureyon (the rest was used in a scarf last fall), so I made this coaster to go along with the cozy. I tried to hand felt it, but it didn't work so well - I'll have to remember to toss it into the wash pile next time we go to the laundromat - if those heavy duty washing machines can't felt it, nothing will! :) (details on ravelry)

The other project I can show you was a little gift for my friend Elizabeth, who's birthday was yesterday.

Everyone likes a chocolate cupcake on their birthday! :)

Here's a view of the top, showing all the 'sprinkles'. This was a great little pattern - its so quick that you could make a several of them in an evening - although adding the picot edging (which isn't in the pattern) and sewing on the beads did make it take a little longer... but so much cuter, too, I think! :) (details on ravelry)

And finally, because its such a lovely spring day outside, let me end with a few photos of the flowers that are blooming in the park I walk through on the way to work.

Can you see the daffodils, hiding in the middle of all that dead vegetation? :)

These crocuses are right next to the path, in an area that gets a little more sun. There are lots of little patches of crocus (and other flowers') leaves along the path, but so far these are the only ones (I've seen) that are blooming. Don't you just love spring?! :)