Sunshine cushion

I can't believe it has been over a week since my last post. This week has gone so fast, and to be honest I have just been plain lazy about posting! In my last post I said that I might have a completed cushion cover to share with you - well, I do!

Here is the cushion made with my latest motif design. I'm calling this motif the sunshine motif. I'm quite pleased with the way this cushion turned out, and I loved working with all these colours!

I think this cushion has a South American feel to it. Something about all the colours together and the sunburst element of the motif. Can anyone else see that?

I also made a button closure for this cushion - I do love that on a crochet cushion, I think it gives such a nice finishing touch! 

I would love to share this pattern with you - I'm actually mulling over the purchase of crochet chart software. I think this would be much better than writing out patterns long-hand, which, let's face it, is a bit of a chore!

Well, I think you have probably had enough of the cushion for now! As Autumn is approaching here with the start of September I've been turning my thoughts to knitwear. More soon!

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Monochrome and colour crochet

Just a quick post tonight- I wanted to show you my latest crochet works in progress!

I've been having fun with 1 colour crochet. Not something I've done much of for a long time, but I do love the effect. It feels more early 20th century vintage style somehow than bright colours mixed together, which I think gives a more 1960s-70s vibe - both are great of course!

The pattern used in the above is my vintage flower square pattern, which I posted the other week. 

I have another new motif design too, which I've also been working in single colour. This is another of my own designs and I hope to post a tutorial in the next few weeks:

Just for fun and because I have a lot of colourful cotton at the moment, I thought I'd also try the second motif pattern in brights too. This is my stash of Rowan Cotton Glace:

Well, I hope you all enjoy the long weekend - I'm away at S's until Monday now, but who knows, perhaps by then I may have a finished cushion cover or two to share with you!

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Borough Market

If you're ever in the London Bridge area on a Saturday, I recommend stopping by Borough Market. Even if you're not buying anything, it's a really great place to look around. S and I had a mosey there on Saturday. There is so much colour and amazing looking produce - I really wish I was more inclined to cook!

 

We saw lots of yummy looking chocolates and cakes:

 

 

Purple and yellow cauliflowers - one of my favourite colour combinations!:

 

 

Loads of varieties of wild mushroom:

 

 

Lots of glossy purple aubergines - very autumnal colours

 

 

and garlic! I love the colour on this garlic actually - purple white and pale green - it looks so delicate.

 

 

We also poked our heads in at Southwark Cathedral:

 

 

Phew, I think that's enough - I actually took waaay more pictures than this, but I can't share them all - I get a bit snap happy sometimes!

 

Hope you're having a good week so far - see you again soon.

 

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Pastel granny squares

 

 

Several months ago I started a pastel coloured granny square project - I remember being very excited about getting a big batch of pastel coloured yarn through the post, and blogging about it here and here. I patiently worked away, making a whole heap of pastel granny squares.

 

 

 

Then, as often happens, other things came along and distracted me - knitting, and brightly coloured yarn in hexagon motifs!

 

The pastel grannies were stashed away in a cupboard awaiting their moment in the sun.

 

This week I pulled out that bag of grannies again and had a think.

 

Originally I was going to use these squares to make a throw, in the same way as I made my Cathedral blanket earlier in the year. However, on looking at the heap of grannies afresh over the weekend, I began to feel that a pastel throw made entirely of little grannies with white seaming might be a little too much somehow. It just didn't 'feel' right.

 

So I decided to work the squares into a much smaller project - a granny square pillow cover for a rectangular cushion.

 

And...................

.............here it is!

 

 

I have to admit, finishing off a project that has been lurking in the back of your cupboard and the back of your mind for a while is a very good feeling! You get some instant gratification because a lot of the work has already been done, and a nice feeling of satisfaction from knowing that the pesky lurking project can be ticked off your mental list!

 

You can see above the new granny cushion getting cosy with the pastel ripple cushions I made earlier in the year. 

 

I do love this cushion - having the pale yellow shade included has really made it very "dolly-mixture", and I like that!

 

 

It was also fun to give the cushion button fastening with lots of little shell buttons. I do love a button fastening for a crochet cushion, I think they are perfect partners.

 

 

The rose pictures are for no particular reason - just because I love roses!

 

Have a happy, creative day wherever you are!

 

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Pink & red

 Pink and red blooms in a hanging basket - they look very striking against the blue tiled wall.

A red phone-box behind a bed of pink and red flowers - looking comically as if it's trying to hide behind a tree!

A single red rose and fallen petal.

Gorgeous vibrant pink blooms along the river.

Hope you've had a lovely weekend.

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Vintage flower bag

I thought I'd share this little pattern for a bag which I designed over the weekend. Hope you enjoy it!

Materials:

2x balls of Rowan Siena in colour A

2x balls of Rowan Siena in colour B.

2.5 mm hook.

Motif

Notes:

To work a 3 treble cluster:

*Yarn round hook, put hook through chain space, yarn round hook, pull yarn through chain space, yarn round hook, pull through first two loops on hook** (one loop remaining on hook). Repeat from * to ** noting that with each repeat you will have gained an extra loop on your hook at the end. Work 3 repeats in total for a 3 treble cluster, and work 5 repeats in total for a 5 treble cluster.

Motif instructions

Chain 4, join into a ring using a slip stitch.

Round 1: Chain 5 (forms first treble and 2 chain). Working into the centre of the ring work *1 treble, chain 2 – repeat from * 4 times more. End by slip stitching into 3^rd of 5 chain worked at start of round. You should now have 6 chain spaces.

Round 2: Work 1 *3 treble cluster, 3 chain, 1 3 treble cluster into first chain space (so you’re working 2 treble clusters into each of the 6 chain spaces). Chain 3 repeat from * to end of round, ending with a 3 chain and slip stitch into top of first 3 treble cluster

Round 3: Work 1 *5 treble cluster into first chain space. Chain 5, repeat from * to end of round, working 1 5 treble cluster into each chain space. End round with 5 chain and slip stitching into top of first 5 treble cluster of the round.

Round 4: Chain 4 into first chain space. Continuing to work in 1st chain space, work 2 double trebles, 2 chain, 4 double trebles. This forms the first corner of the motif. *Work 4 trebles into next chain space, then 4 trebles into next chain space. Work 4 double trebles, 2 chain, 4 double trebles into next chain space. Repeat from to end of round. Finish round by slip stitching into top of 4 chain from start of round.

Make 6 motifs for each bag panel.

Making up body of bag

Double crochet edges of motifs together to join to form a square. When you have joined enough motifs to form the first side, work a round of double crochet around the entire edge of that side. 

Work 2 rows of treble crochet across one edge – this will form the opening edge of the bag.

Repeat the process on the motifs for the second side of the bag.

To join the 2 sides to form the body of the bag, holding the two sides together with wrong sides facing inwards, double crochet the sides together around three of the edges (the fourth edge of left open). 

Work 1 row of double crochet around the opening of the bag. 

Handles – make 2

Chain 121. Work 1 dc in 2^nd chain from hook. Work 1 dc into each chain to end. Chain 1 and turn. Work a further 5 rows of dc then fasten off.

Attach the handles to the bag inside the opening.

Hexagon blanket

This week I finally finished my hexagon blanket! This blanket has taken me quite a while - I started it back in May, do you remember?

For those of you who like to know this sort of thing, here are some blanket statistics for you, this blankt is:

195 hexgaons

double knit yarn (various types)

single bed size

lovely and snuggly!

I am so glad I have finally managed to make this blanket - after a couple of false starts over the years.

Hope you have a creative Sunday - now I'm off for some more happy hooky!

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July!!

Hi everyone, I'm happy to be able to share a mosaic of the month with you again!

July has felt like a happy, colourful sort of month - especially the last couple of weeks and I am sooo grateful for that! I hope you have all had a lovely month too - see you in August!

My weekend

Hello everyone! I hope you have all had a nice weekend.

S and I had our usual cosy weekend together, wandering around town and then settling down to watch a film on Saturday night.

I have some yarny goings on to relate! In my last post I showed you a big pile of scrap yarn and asked you if you could guess what I was going to turn it into.

Well here you are....

Yes, you might have guessed, it's a granny square somthing!

This will eventually become a cushion cover I hope. I was inspired by an old post which I saw on the Attic 24 blog last week, where Lucy had made a granny square cushion cover from her own stash of colourful scraps. You can find her post here.

As you can see my cushion has 3 round granny squares rather than the 2 round ones in the cushion cover Lucy made. That's just because I didn't think I could cope with so many teeny squares, as beautiful as they look in Lucy's pictures! I also plan to make a matching granny sqaure back for my cushion - I really do have a lot of little scraps!

 I also bought something over the weekend, which I plan to use for my granny cushion cover - this cute little jar of multi-coloured buttons!

I have had my eye on this little jar for a while. I got it in the haberdashery department at John Lewis - I just couldn't resist! There are also versions in single colour hues (blue/blue green and white) and a pastel coloured button selection! Hmm, I think I may have to go back and get the other colours too! Now, I'm sure you want to see a bit more of the colourful contents of this jar....

I think a couple of these little darlings will look perfect as a button fastening for my cushion when it is finished - if I can bring myself to use them!

As usual I also had a look at the yarn whilst in John Lewis. Although I did make a purchase (which I'll show you soon - and don't worry I did stick within my self imposed yarn budget - so far!) I came away feeling a little disappointed to be honest. One type of yarn which I loved - Debbie Bliss Cashmerino DK - has been discontinued. I loved this yarn because there were so many bright, rich colours. Looking at the other yarns in the store, I just couldn't find anything at all similar. In fact, the colour palettes of most of the other dk wool-mix yarns seem quite muted at the moment. I'm going to have to search for a brand that does the kind of colours I like.

On my travels this weekend, I saw some lovely flowers in various locations:

All these flowers are the kind of colours that I want for my next crochet project, but currently can't find. I'm thinking of rich magenta, geranium and pomegranate reds, violets and lavender, golden yellow, azure blue and turquiose and kingfisher or peacock colours.

Can anyone suggest a yarn I might try?

Hope you all had a lovely crafty weekend!

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