My First Go at Pattern Making

So I have had my idea for what I want to make for my niece for awhile now, and in my perusals around the internet I've come across inspiration, but not a pattern per se. Actually I did find a pattern for something similar at some point, but then I had some other ideas on how I wanted to tweak it further. So I drafted my first pattern.

When I envision it coming together in my mind it seems simple, so I started sketching it out:Then I realized my great vision was going to make things more complicated:
When all was said and done, I had a handful or instructions and I was less sure that it would be as easy as I once thought:Oy. Oh well . . . I'm just going to go for it. If my pattern has flaws, I will hone my stitch picking technique at least!