Tuesday, 30 October 2018

Autumn Crochet : A Cute Owl Adorns a Renewable Everlasting Sachet

I could not resist trying out this pattern for a Crocheted Owl Granny Square, created by Sarah of the cleverly named blog Repeat Crafter Me.

I used it to make one of my “Renewable Everlasting Sachets”, that smell exactly how you want them too because you’re the one who adds the scent via your favourite essential oils or perfume, first written about in this post.

The way these work is that a 100% cotton insert cushion goes into an attractive cover. You add a few drops of essential oil or sprays of perfume to the insert, which are absorbed by the cotton. When dry, you put the cover on and hang to display. You can renew the scent whenever you please.

Considering that this is the fourth one I’ve made, these work very nicely. You could say I am hooked on them (haha, a lame crocheting joke.)

They’re terrific for adding a nice scent to a smaller room, or to scent a drawer or suitcase. We have one hanging in our guest washroom, which I refresh with new oil before people come over. So far, I’ve made one that works for Spring and Summer decor (the one linked above), and a second one for the Christmas season, shown in this post.

I also made one as a gift for my sister, which I wrapped along with a bottle of lavender essential oil. She loves the scent of lavender and really liked the gift. You can see that one and shots of her opening the gift in this post, if you’d like.

So, I needed one for Autumn, which is where that charming little owl comes in.

The only change I made to Sarah’s pattern is I switched the angle of the background, so it hangs in a diamond shape rather than a square. When you (crocheters) look at the pattern you’ll see that this is quite an easy change.

Also, to make the square a bit larger, I added an additional row of half-double crochet stitches all the way around the square, with the corners being “two half-double, one chain, two half doubles” into the corner stitch of the preceding row.

This project is a great stash-buster. I used up some of the vintage tapestry wool I was given by a friend and a number 4 hook.

To turn this into a sachet cover, you then make a couple of pieces for the backing by crocheting rows of half-double stitches *. Make them long (tall) enough so that when attached to the granny-square front piece, they overlap by one row.

Add a border of single stitches around each, so they end up looking like what is pictured below. To make the button holes chain 2 and skip 2 stitches while doing the border.

The pieces are then attached together with a crocheted running stitch, going through both layers (and all three layers for the bits that overlap), all the way around. The hanging loop is a chain of ten, attached to the top corner of the diamond.

Lastly, sew on your buttons.

Note that there are no instructions to weave in any ends (my least favourite part of crocheting) … that’s because they can all hide safely inside the cover. But, of course, if you’d prefer, go ahead and weave in all your ends!

* Mine turned out to be 4 inches square. My backing pieces are 16 half-double stitches wide, and 6 and 4 rows high, with a band of single crochet stitches around each, before they’re attached to the front with another row of single stitches all the way around.

To make the insert, take two pieces of absorbent cotton, cut in squares that are the same size as your completed crocheted cover, and some pure cotton cotton-balls. (Again, these should be pure cotton in order to absorb the essential oils or perfume. Polyester, nylon or acrylic won’t work for this project.)

Choose a colour for your fabric that will blend in with the cover, as crochet being what it is, you often can see through it in spots. For this Owl one, I make my cushion insert with dark navy blue cotton, but for the tan coloured flower one I made for Spring/Summer, I used a light creamy colour for the insert.

Fluff up your cotton balls by breaking them apart.

If there’s a right side to your fabric, put those together. Then, by hand, make a running stitch about 1/3 inch from the edge, leaving about a two inch open (leaving the needle and thread still attached).