August on Instagram

It's been a month full of pastels, flowers, yarn, tea and lots of crochet!

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A happy little cushion

I decided a couple of weeks ago that quite a few of our cushions in the living room were starting to look a little tired and in need of freshening up.

So, naturally, I thought that I would crochet some pretty new covers! Above is one I finished a few days ago. I love the sunny yellow colour and it really brightens up the sofa. I'm so happy with it and it's had the nod of approval from the rest of the family as well!

I made two solid 12 round granny squares for the front and back pieces and crocheted 3 sides together using double crochet. I left one side open and attached some polka dot buttons so that the cushion cover could be washed - very important in this house! I used a 3.5mm hook and 2 balls of Sirdar Snuggly DK in shade Daisy. The little roses and leaves were made using scraps of DK yarn I had.

The pattern for the solid squares can be found on the wonderful Attic24 blog (link in my side bar) and the pattern for the roses and leaves are from Cute & Easy Crochet with Flowers by Nicki Trench.

I love my new little cushion and have already started on another!

Thank you so much for the suggestions given on my last post. You have given me some fantastic ideas and I can't wait to get started...you really are a fantastic lot...thank you.

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Recommendations needed...

...for a crochet garment for myself! 

Recently I've been thinking that I would really love to crochet something to wear. Not a scarf or wrist warmers or anything like that, but a cardigan or top.

The thing is...it has to be a simple pattern with minimal sewing up if possible as I tend to find that my sewing up of an item lets me down. I also have around 300g of the pretty pink 4ply yarn you can see in the photo above so it would be great if I could use this up, but that's not absolutely essential.

Has anyone ever made such a garment?! Does such a pattern exist?! If it is does I would be really grateful if anyone could point me in the right direction.

Thank you!

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Quality time...

...the last few days of the school summer holidays are over and my Miss M goes back to school tomorrow.  We are both quite sad about this - we've had a really nice summer, even though the weather has very rarely been summer like! 

Our baking challenge continues! The first week was a disaster....we made 'Cake in a Jar' and it looked and tasted awful! This week we made a chocolate cake with vanilla icing (which my girl piped on, she loved doing this) which I'm glad to say was so much nicer.

We went to do some ceramic painting which is one of our favourite things to do together.  I painted the little cow you can see in the photo which Miss M has named Daisy - very original! 

We went to see the Kelpies which I loved - they are so impressive! The weather was very cloudy and grey that day but somehow it added to the experience for me and I loved the way the Kelpies looked against the moody sky. On the way home we went to Kelvingrove museum in Glasgow which is one of Miss M's favourite places to go. 

My girl was very keen to do some sewing using the sewing machine and she ended up spending an afternoon making a pile of cute little cushions to give to her friends!

I had a go at some amigurumi this week and made this little cat which Miss M had seen in my Simply Crochet magazine and loved. I have to say...amigurumi is not for me! All that counting! I didn't really enjoy making it to be honest and the poor little cat is quite wonky! But my girl likes it and that's the main thing. I'm just hoping that she won't ask for anymore amigurumi toys...blankets and cushions etc are more my thing!

So back to the usual routine for us tomorrow...but then I've told myself it won't be long until the next school holiday!

Wishing you all a lovely week.

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A little pink dress

I finished the little baby dress I started last week. I absolutely loved making this and I really didn't want to put it down whenever I started working on it! 

The pattern is pretty simple and is worked from the top down which meant there was minimal sewing up.  This was definitely a good thing as that's the part I struggle with whenever I make garments. I'm sure that I will make this wee dress again as it was a pleasure to crochet and I love how it's turned out. 

The pattern is from Cute & Easy Crocheted Baby Clothes by Nicki Trench. I adore this book, the patterns are so pretty and there is a good variety of items for boys and girls. I really recommend it if you have wee ones to make things for. 

The yarn I used was Sirdar Snuggly (my favourite baby yarn!) in shade Little Bud.  I used some cute little daisy buttons for the back.  The dress is made to fit a 6-9 month baby.

I am going to be an Aunty again soon and if the baby is a girl I will definitely be giving her this little dress as a gift! In fact, I'm thinking of making a blanket to coordinate with it as well...

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This and that

I've really been enjoying making a pot of tea in the afternoons and taking the time to have a couple of cups of tea. I've also decided that I really want to make another couple of tea cosies...despite G protesting that there's really no need!

Miss M and I are looking forward to The Great British Bake Off starting again this week!  We both enjoy it so much and love watching it together. This year, we have set ourselves a little challenge to try to bake something new each week. Our own little Bake Off challenge!

I finally bought a hydrangea to plant in the garden. I've wanted one for ages and kept meaning to get one each year so I'm glad I've eventually done it. G has planted it for me and I'm hoping that as long as I only admire it and not touch it (I have a bad track record with plants of any kind!) it should do okay in the garden.

Do you like my tiny little house ornament? My mum and Miss M gave it to me as a little gift and it's so cute, I really love it. 

As usual, there is some crochet on the go here. I bought some new yarn for my Island blanket which I started on holiday and will talk more about another time. I'm using Stylecraft Life DK in mint again...I'm obsessed with this colour at the moment. I also have another Sugar & Spice cardigan on my hook at the moment, this time for my 3 year old niece. This will be the 4th time I've used this pattern! Needless to say, I love it. I also have a little baby dress in the softest pink on the go for my friends wee girl. I'm really hoping this works out as if it does I can see me making more of them as gifts. 

So...quite a long post from me for a change! Thank you so much for the lovely comments on my melon-mint bag I appreciate them so much :-)

Wishing you all a lovely week!

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