Working hard…

but not necessarily on the nice things! I haven’t had time for any sewing, knitting, crochet – well I have but I’ve been too tired to do any.

We’ve just had our busiest week of the year at work, getting all the final shows ready. Now, you might think that putting work on boards and plinths is easy but we had to lug those boards and plinths in to the rooms and paint them after removing all the tables and chairs and general accumulated rubbish. It was a week of moving and shifting and we’ve got more to do next week taking them all down and putting more shows up. Phew, it’s hard work and we’ve been too tired to do anything when we get home.

We also bought a wii. I know, a bit late to the party but I really wanted the wii fit because we’re all a bit lardy and there is no way I can afford to join a gym or want to suffer the humiliation of jogging in front of other people. At least when I catch sight of myself in the mirror as I fall over trying to perfect my yoga I can comfort myself with the knowledge that only I can see me. The only annoying thing is that my brother has lost 5lb in 3 days and I’ve put 1lb on!

It’s been a bit rainy lately and I haven’t been in the garden much so imagine my surprise when I checked my vegetables this morning and there was actual produce! God bless plants that look after themselves.

Peppers

Tomatoes just starting to flower

Savoy cabbage

Maize

My pride and joy, a teensy cauliflower the size of a tennis ball

Strawberries and blackberries

Goosegogs and apples

Broad beans and runner beans

Yum, yum, yum!

Beccy

Crochet flower cushion…

This is a practice for Christmas presents (I know, it’s June, but if I don’t start really early I’ll be doing it all last minute!)

The pattern is Fanciful Flowers Potholder by Claudia Lowman.

I used an old jumper for the back but it is a bit too stretchy – next time I’ll crochet another circle (I’m just too lazy to do it just now for this one) I also won’t use white for the base but it was an odd ball I wasn’t likely to use for much else and this was only meant to be a practice run.

Sewing the back to the front face-to-face was a bit tricky because of the different weights and the extra row of petals on the edge of the front getting in the way.

It worked out ok though! When we got rid of our old sofas I kept all the cushions with a view to reusing the stuffing for this sort of thing. Don’t you just love it when your hoarding tendencies are justified? This cushion cost about £1 to make (if I don’t bill for my time) but it’s worth much more because handmade is pretty much always better.

Next time I’ll crochet the back, use a darkish colour for the base layer, and I might stick a great big button in the centre. All in all I’m pleased with how it came out and I’m looking forward to making lots for prezzies!

Beccy

Teensy alterations can make all the difference…

Every artist should have a smock, but I draw the line at living in a garret.
I got this great smock top for £3.25 from a charity shop on Friday and although I loved the top part, the bottom was a crazy gathered bubble hem that gave me more hips than I deserve.

I buttoned it up to the bottom and it was like a hobble skirt! Ok, so you’re probably not meant to wear it like that but either way it made me look a little like Andy Pandy.

I didn’t want to mess with it too much, so I just cut off the hem and re-hemmed it straight.

It’s very comfy and yes, it’s still quite Andy Pandy now I’ve lodged that image in your head, but I’ll be wearing it with a belt to avoid that and the obvious maternity look.

The only other thing is I might have to re-sew all the buttons – who bothers putting on anchor buttons but forgets to orient them the right way. Sideways anchors? It’s only a little thing but it annoys the bejingers out of me!
Beccy

Crochet car seat covers finished!

So, I dropped a cake (icing down of course) on the passenger seat of my car… and then Elle did the same thing. It was the stupid cake tin’s fault and it was such a beautiful lemon cake with lemon butter icing that I had baked the day before and we were taking to a friends house.

We ate the cake anyway because it was a nice cake and the germs don’t stick if you pick it up within 2 seconds right? But buttercream is very hard to get out of seat covers so I decided to crochet some lovely new seat covers to cover the stain. I was always going to anyway, but now I had a reason.

Some people pimp their rides with giant speakers and weird blue lights underneath, not me.

The hexagons are motif 30 from Edie Eckman’s Beyond the square, but only the first two rounds because I think smaller is cuter. I crocheted a lot of them before I actually bothered to measure the carseat, and even when I did I had to make a fair few more.

Doesn’t look like much so far but I wanted to show you a work in progress pic - I was making it up as I went along! (and you can just see the water stain in this pic, where I had tried to clean the buttercream off)

And the final covers. What you can’t see in the photo is that I made them a bit like box cushions but without a base and a back, and then I crocheted a final row around the bottom with a loop every 5 stitches or so. I made a long chain to thread through all the loops and tied it behind the seat.

All done! They took a couple of months because I was winging it but I’m pretty pleased with them – I want to make covers for the backs now but I might have to do something a bit simpler.

Note: Make them slightly smaller than you need because they will stretch!

Edited to add:

I was asked for a picture of the edging so here you go!

The loops are formed by chaining 5 then single crochet into the next stitch. Single crochet 4 more then form another loop.

The loops on the points are chain 5 then single crochet into the same stitch.

Beccy