Desert Cushion
Today it is once again because of all of you that I feel that way. I posted my new shawl pattern last week and you've been absolute darlings about it, you really have. Wonderful, supportive and just plain brilliant. Thank you so much to everyone who has brought a copy, I really hope you enjoy making and wearing your shawls too!
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In the meantime though, do you find, like I do, that's it's actually incredibly hard to finish up all those left over bits and bobs of yarn from other projects? I seen to have great difficulty with this. Either I don't have the right colour, or the right weight, or quite the right amount to do what I have in mind. So when I do dip into stash, I often either end up buying another colour, or running out something and needing a new ball, which then of course, has some left over at the end.
So my aim with this cushion was to make it completely from stash, working just from what I have and nothing else. I had quite a collection of Baby Cashmerino at one time and I have lots of old bits and pieces left over, mostly in old discontinued colours, so I can't buy more even if I wanted too.
So I set about making squares. The palette was mostly dictated by the colours I had, rather than my choices, with the exception of a few omitted on the grounds that I felt they really wouldn't work. It was a quirky mix that I ended up with, but have a look what it made...
Do you like it? I really, really do. I think it's kind of zesty and zingy.
What amazes me is how good it manages to look with so little consideration of the colours. I mean, you agonise over these things sometimes, pondering your choices, removing this colour, adding another, changing them back again, never quite sure what to do for the best. Then, there's this, where I pulled out all the colours I had that I didn't have enough to do anything else with and shoved them in a basket and set to work and that was it. It makes me wonder why I think so long and hard about these things the majority of the time - perhaps winging it is the way forward.
The other thing I love about this cushion is the way I joined the squares together. It's nothing fancy, just through the back loop with double crochet (that's sc's for my US friends). It's something I've been wanting to do for ages but I've just never found the right thing to use it on. I've seen it used by other people a million times and to great effect, but I've always ripped it out whenever I've tried it before.
It's those ridges it creates that get me, they seem like vast mountain ranges that turn each square into a deep valley. I almost, almost ripped it out this time too, but I'm so glad I didn't. I love the white gridline effect and I even love the mountains and valleys, on this cushion at least.
And to show that this is really and truly a project of odd and ends only, take a look at the back. A mismatched and 'grandma's old granny square blanket' piece of crochet as you'll ever see I think. I very nearly raided my stash to find a nice new ball to make the back entirely cream but then I stopped myself. No, the idea was to use up pieces of leftover yarn only and so I forced myself to work only with what I had left.
I confess, my neat, ordered, logical mind really wants that back to be all cream still. It screams a little tiny bit to see the randomness of those colours, the disorder of one row in a colour and then three in another with no pattern or sense or cohesion to it at all. It unsettles me. But in another way I do love that it means it really is a true scrap cushion. Left overs only. Nothing new was brought, the cushion pad is from another cushion, it makes use of only what I already have.
Waste not, want not. Nanna would be proud.
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: : DESERT CUSHION : :
Pattern:
Squares from a pattern by Sidsel J. Høivik
Tutorial for Tiny Little Coat Squares by Lucy of Attic 24
Yarn: Scraps of Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino (mostly)
Hook: 3.5mm (3 USA)
Ravelry Page
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