Wednesday 24 June 2015

The Paisley Granny Cushion and Mini Construction Tutorial

 
Hello there, it's finally finished, the Paisley Granny Cushion had it's first outing in the garden yesterday. I am very pleased with this cushion, the colours look so good in the the sunshine, especially the turquoise, the bright light really brings it out.





The schools here break up earlier than other parts of the UK, finishing up today for the summer holidays, so yesterday I took my finished cushion, a magazine and my ereader and had some quiet me time. This is my favourite shady spot in garden, I love to see the sunshine but don't like sitting in it as I'm fair skinned and burn too easily so while everyone else soaks up the sun on the patio I'm to be found enjoying the dappled shade under the tree. Both N and I like to have a scented, bee friendly garden and I was really pleased to see buds yesterday on the Graham Thomas honeysuckle I planted a couple of years ago to grow up through the tree.





Once I had joined the motifs for the cushion front it wasn't quite tall enough so I worked two stripes at the top and bottom of the cushion first with pink then orange. I knew I didn't want to make the back the same as the front so decided to crochet it in one piece which I wanted to make in blocks of colour. To break up the turquoise, I chose orange and pink for the colour blocks, making a pink central block which I decided to make slightly bigger than the two orange blocks at either end. I like this, it would make a nice summer cushion even without the paisley squares.

As I will be using this cushion outdoors I wanted to be able to easily slip off the cover for washing so using the orange I made a chain long enough for a 50cm cushion, then worked a foundation row of double crochet before continuing in treble crochet. I worked an extra three rows on the bottom section so I would be able to fold it over the cushion inner and tuck in when finished before changing to the pink yarn.



Constructing the Cushion

 

To make up, I double crocheted with wrong sides together starting at the bottom right corner with the granny front facing and worked around the sides with three dc in each corner.



When I reached the bottom of the third side, I double crocheted the two sides together until I reached the join of the first two motifs, then marking the join for the last motif on the other side, I continued to dc along the front edge only.



When I reached the stitch marker, I again double crocheted the two sides together to the end of the row then all I had to do was tie off the yarn, weave in the ends and lightly press the fold. You could add poppers at this point but I was too impatient to get into the garden with mine.

 


I popped in the cushion inner, tucked the flap inside and headed into the garden. I love that this cushion is a one-off and as all our garden furniture and camping chairs are different blues, it goes with them all.





As N will now be on holiday until August I hope the rainy weather we have mostly been having will ease off  and we will get some lazy, sunny holiday days to chill out in the garden, with some crochet for me of course. I hope the mini cushion construction tutorial is helpful if you also want to make a summer outdoor cushion.

Til next time,

Hx





9 comments:

  1. Love your cushion! It's gorgeous...so bright and cheery.
    Marianne x

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  2. I love your cushion. The colours are so good together and so cheerful.

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  3. How beautiful is this cushion and how lovely looks this part of your garden! Hope you have a lot of warm and sunny days ahead. Enjoy your holidays and have fun!
    Olympia

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  4. Perfect! It looks absolutely gorgeous in the summer sun xx

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  5. Your paisley cushion is lovely. I made one paisley motif before. Don't think I could make a whole bunch for a pillow and have never seen them done up in a square before. Very pretty. Your yard and garden looks great. Enjoy!

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  6. Your cushion is brilliant - I've never seen crocheted paisley designs before. It looks good in your comfy garden chair. I'm not fair-skinned but don't like to sit in full sun, always heading for somewhere in a bit of shade - so much more comfortable! Your chair and cushion look just the ticket :)
    Cathy x

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  7. This is my first visit to your blog and I'm just in time to see this gorgeous cushion.
    Amalia
    xo

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  8. What a fun pillow, its very striking

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Thank you for taking time to comment, I love to read them all and will reply to any questions as soon as I can.