Crochet cushion

The last time I wrote about this cushion it was a pile of undoings. The undoings have become trimmings. And the cushion is complete!

But let’s start at the very beginning.

The pattern is from the book Cute and Easy Crochet by Nicki Trench. I love this book. As soon as I picked it up there were lots of projects I wanted to try and I’ve already bought the yarn for a couple of them.

Finding the yarn for this one proved more difficult than I thought. The inspiration for my colour choice was this cushion from Next. I wanted the same rich, bright, vibrant colours.

I found some brands which had the vibrancy but not the colours I needed. Others were out of my price range.

Then I discovered King Cole Bamboo Cotton in Abakhan and we had a winner. There’s not a huge colour range but it had all the shades I was looking for. These are the ones I chose:

Blush Pink 520, Yellow 523, Peacock 531, Green 533, Fuchsia 536, Violet 537

I’ve been thrilled with this yarn: it crochets beautifully, is soft to the touch and has a lovely drape.

The pattern was simple to follow though I varied it by continuing the repeat in the later rows rather than following the pattern strictly.

I also varied the pattern by changing the edge. The recommended double crochet edging seemed too narrow and I wanted it to stand out more. So, I did a half treble instead.

 The original pattern also described the pad being fully enclosed in the cover. However, I wanted to be able to remove it for washing so worked out a way to make an opening for a zip. I crocheted around until all that was left was enough space for the zip. Then I crocheted a row on both the outer and inner loops of the opening, and used the inner row to attach the zip. It took a couple of gos to work out the best way to attach the zip so that the opening lies as flat as possible (though it does still flap open).

And here's the finished cushion. Ta-dah!

And here it is again with the bird cushion which inspired it. I really enjoyed making it and I think I'm now ready for something more challenging. Watch this space!