Crocheted Broccoli

My very close friend recently bought a toy broccoli from Ikea.

This soon turned into a bit of a thing when she began to take pictures of 'Brocolli''s visits to tourist destinations and uploading them onto Facebook.

So for her 30th Birthday I decided to attempt something I had never attempted before - crocheting a vegetable!

I made her a miniature version of her beloved a vegy-pal. 

Here he is. 

An ever so slightly bonkers birthday prezzy for my ever so slightly bonkers (but then who isn't?!) and truly lovely friend...

I would give you a free pattern, just in case you have the urge to crochet some greens, but I'm afraid I completely made it up as I went along.

I worked the stalk in the round (light green) and the cloud-like part (dark green) was an amalgamation of pop-corn stitch and trebble crochet decreasing into the stalk at the end. I sewed on some little beads for eyes and stitched a couple of simple stitches of black cotton to make the mouth and tada!

One cute little broccoli, crocheted with love! 

Popcorn Stitch Around A Blanket

I'm having a lot of fun putting that bobbly popcorn stitch around my ongoing blanket. I wanted to give the blanket a bit of texture. With baby number one on the way (due in December) I thought it would be sweet to add these bobbly bits around the outside to add cosy tactility for tiny fingers. I'm hoping to do at least two rows of this in a zigzagging alternating pattern. It takes  a while but is lovely and therapeutic once you get into the rhythm of it. Here are some pictures of one side of one row done, to give you the general idea of how it looks...

To learn how to do the popcorn stitch for yourself, or to find out a bit more about it, click here.

Super-cute Crocheted Pin Cushions

Look at these crazily cute crocheted takes on the traditional pin cushion. Aren't they just the most adorable things!?! 

Follow the links at the bottom of the pictures to see them in their original context. (The first one has a free pattern so you can have a go!)

Free pattern available on amigurumipatterns

By Doni at Whiskers & Wool

By Becky Oh at Eightlegs

I stumbled across these lovelies on pinterest. To see more of my pins click here.

Crocheting a business card case

I am part way through a really simple little project, where I am effectively crocheting a little sock to fit around my business cards so that they can stay nice and shiny even despite being in the bottom of my handbag all day every day.

Here's what I did;

*Crochet a chain twice as long as the business card is wide.
*Add a few chains if you want to fit a good number of cards in there.
*Slip stitch into a ring.
*Double crochet in every chain.
*Work round and round and round in double crochet stitches until it is long enough.
*Sew or crochet one end together to creat the bottom of the case.
*decorate to your liking

Voila

Here is a picture of a little basket that I have made out of parcel string. Doesn't it look cute?! It is only small but I have filled mine to the brim with silver brooch backs that I use all of the time when I am making my flower brooches. 

Little parcel string basket looking out of the window, what can you see?

I am going to start selling these string baskets soon for just £5 each (or a set of 3 for £13.50). This is a bargain as they take a bit longer than crocheting with wool as the string is slightly more strenuous a fabric to work with - but at least I will have toned arms by the time I've crocheted a few more of these!

If you would like to use this picture in your blog etc. you are really welcome to, but please do link it back to www.theflowermill.weebly.com. Thank you kindly.

Experimenting with parcel string

I'm having a little go at crocheting a storage basket for myself out of parcel string...