From old to new.

A neighbour of ours recently moved from his council owned property to a new bungalow. His sofa's were too big to take and so he gave the larger one away and offered the smaller to us. We didn't really want it but the neighbour as in a hurry to hand his keys back and would have been charged by the council if it was left in the property so John offered to take it to the skips to save him the worry or final bill. As the sofa was being loaded in the car John called me to see if I wanted the cushions, they were the loose sort, that zip onto the sofa. So of course I said why not, and ended up with four huge cushions and the foam seat pads too. Well you never know when they might be useful.

Well actually they came in useful within days! I had been thinking of creating a cozy corner for the little ones to sit and read, cuddle, sing or rest but didn't have the money to buy anything specific. So I covered the foam and created an L shaped sofa, and then I made covers for the cushions, creating a lovely comfy area for all to enjoy.

At the moment the foam "sofa" is covered by a blanket as i didn't have anything big enough to use. I'm thinking of maybe crochet covers when I get time? The cushion covers were all made from fabric I already had.
The blue cushion has an Ikea print on one side, bought from the bargain bin, and plain blue flannel on the other, an old cot sheet I have kept for many years.

The green cushion has a floral soft cord on one side, a cutoff bought cheaply when I first found I was carrying a little girl (Heather) and with dreams of a pretty little sundress or two, the reverse a plain green heavy cotton leftover from sewing the blind for our bathroom.

The pink cushion has a dainty flower print on one side, which used to be a pair of curtains I found in a charity shop for £1, the back is a deep pink linen left from a sling I made for Emma to carry Sophie in.
And the pirate cushion, well that has been claimed by Owen. The pirate fabric was an offcut for 50p, and the purple reverse side was leftover from recovering an old blanket box found in a house we moved into ten years ago.

So a lovely cosy place for reading stories, yet with lots of stories all of it's own.

Stashbusting - part 3.

So if you read the other blog you'll know that I have been otherwise occupied the past couple of weeks. But I did manage to finish the stashbusting exercise and use those final scraps of Adriafil merino left over from the jumper and hat. And this is what I came up with:


The pattern is from this book. I've used the pattern before but that time for a friend so I remembered it was really quick and simple and used very little yarn so thought I would give it a go and hope the wool would be enough. Fortunately it was but with only inches to spare!
Anyway they should keep little feet warm when playing outside. And as they're so easy to make I think a couple more pairs might be useful as I imagine they might dirty pretty quickly as Heather loves to explore.

Stashbusting - part two.

So I made the hat to match the sweater:


Sorry for the poor photo quality but I just thought this was the most beautiful picture of our little girl, I just had to share.
Again this was hashed up as I went along so no pattern. The leading edge is 8 rows of garter stitch and the rest is plain old stocking stitch, again chosen to show off the colour changes. The decrease was worked with the SL1, K1, PSSO spiral and dropped 6sts on each row I think. I love that little spiral effect on the crown and it looks great on little peoples hats don't you think?
There's about half of one ball left now and a few oddments so I have an idea for them already in mind. Hopefully there will be just enough wool to follow it through. We should all know by tomorrow ;-)

Stashbusting - part one.

The great thing about keeping a crafting blog is that I have points of reference for all things I do, and a record of when I did it, or didn't! So looking back a few days ago to this time last year I came across this post, and remembering how lovely the colours were I decided to dig out the wool again. Well I also remembered that it is a very fine DK, more of a cross between DK and 4 ply, so I thought I would hash up a pattern as I went along rather than relying on following one. I made that mistake here, and had to rip it all back once already. Added to the lack of pattern was the fact that that ripped back wool won't knit to the specified tension anyway as it is more springy and finer than before.
So I thought I'd make a little jumper for Heather and this is what I ended up with:



She definitely has better things to do than pose in her new jumper, can't you tell?

The yarn is Adriafil knitcol 100% merino and self patterned to give these lovely stripes. I didn't want to distort the striped effect by ribbing any part of the jumper so I worked a picot edging to the hem and cuffs instead. I also avoided ribbing the neckline by working a row of double crochet right round, including across the button shoulder opening.
So one more ball of this wool left and I'm thinking a hat might be nice?
Or maybe that would be stripey overkill?

Socks/bootees

Something to keep little Miss's feet warm - crochet bootee/socks.
I found an old crochet book in the charity shop sometime last year and it is full of great patterns. The book was printed in the early 1980's but the patterns are so adaptable, all that is needed is different yarns and colourways. I think these bootees are really cute and can't be aged - don't you?


Technical details:
Worked in DC on a 4mm hook. The yarn is the same Debbie Bliss baby cashmerino as used for the hat a little further down. This yarn is so lovely and although a little more expensive than some of it's equivalents, it really is worth the extra, supersoft and some gorgeous colours. I think there may be a few more hats and bootees to follow over the months with some other shades of this yarn.
Crochet is going on hold for a little while now, I really nust finish the cable socks for john. And I have a little sweater for Miss just started on the knitting needles. And of course the last few things on the started list. And then I can break my self imposed ban on yarn buying ;-)

Loving crochet.

I can't believe I hid from crochet for so long, it's so portable and easy to pick up and put down, it's easy to add a few extra rows if necessary and equally easy to rip back. Unlike knitting where a mistake means unpicking stitch by stitch very slowly. And the best thing about crochet.............no casting off! Mind you I don't crochet properly I don't think. All the expert crocheters I see/watch manage to fly along just catching the wool and drawing it through the loops with the hook whereas I crochet like a knitter, by wrapping the wool around the hook and then drawing it through the loops. I'm guessing this probably makes it a considerably slower way to work but the other way is just beyond me so I will carry on plodding along in my own way.
So here's my latest crochet make - a new hat for Heather. The pattern said that this was a quick make but in reality it took me about five hours over two sleepless nights. I used Debbie Bliss baby cashmerino and a 4mm hook and worked the whole hat in half treble stitch. See I'm even learning to read patterns and use the technical terms ;-). I am really pleased with and think it looks great although I suspect that's more down to the wearer than the hat.

Pompon!

Well I used the Rico Pompon that I bought a couple of weeks ago. I did settle with the idea of knitting a bathmat/rug and it knitted up really quickly. I cast on 24sts and just knitted and knitted until the two balls were used. I followed the suggestion to use 4mm needles and knit 2sts between each pompon and I found it was simple yarn to knit with. But I don't like it. It was a nuisance to have to keep peeking at it to keep the pompons all lying nicely and it is quite a boring yarn to use. But I'm glad I tried it. Can't imagine it being used for a scarf as most patterns suggest, it's very bulky and not something I would feel comfortable with around my neck. Also I really should have used a preliminary cast on as the first row was very tight and created a curve which can't be blocked out. The cast off had the same problem although less so. But as it's only for our bathroom and won't be seen by many I decided to leave it as it was rather than mess around unpicking the first and last rows. Who knows, maybe it will start to irritate me and I will do something about it in the future.......