Pillows!

Remember I said I had some small crochet projects to show?

Well, here's two of them:

The first is a pillow I crocheted for my 10 year old niece Rosie (my niece Jenna's older sister) to match her bedrooms. Her bedroom is lime green (yep, it's bright!) with a lime green, hot pink, and white floral bedding set. I think this pillow matches pretty good. I used a 14" pillow form, and sewed two pieces of gingham fabric (with my crappy hand sewing skills!) over it to make a cover.

Here are the stats:

Pattern: Afghan Reincarnation - Crochet Today, December 06/January 07 issue

Yarn: Bernat Softee Chunky in Hot Pink, Hot Green, and White

Hooks: J & K

I also have a picture of Rosie with my Bethany, when they had a sleepover a few weeks ago:

Aren't the matching dresses cute?! My mom bought them for the girls last year.

The other project I have to show is a pillow I crocheted for Bethany. I saw a pattern for crocheted letters in a book, and thought of making a monogram pillow.

Here's a photo and stats:

Pattern: Letter from the book "201 Crochet Motifs, Blocks, Projects, and Ideas"

Yarn: Vanna's Choice Baby in Lamb, Aqua, & Mint

Hooks: I & K

I used a single crochet square worked in rounds with an I hook for the base. For the letter I crocheted with a double strand of yarn and a K hook to make the letter B extra-big. I think it would probably have looked better done in a chunky weight yarn, but I couldn't find an inexpensive chunky weight in the colors Bethany wanted.

I'm going to crochet a D pillow for my Dominic soon. Poor kid never gets any thing crocheted for him. It's just so difficult finding crochet patterns for boys that are beyond the baby/toddler years. Dominic is crazy about pirates, and loves dressing up as one. He had a pirate hat from his Halloween costume last year, but it's been long since lost, so he gets dressed up in the remaining pieces from his costume, and then puts a pencil case (unzipped, and turned sideways) on his head for a hat, ha, ha! It's hilarious! I'm going to have to snap a picture of him the next time he does it, so I can embarass him with it when he gets older. The other day he asked me if I can "yarn him a pirate hat". He's going to have to settle for one from the store, because even if I did have a pattern, I think that's way beyond my level of expertise.

In other news, the new job is going good. The work is pretty boring, but it's easy, and the supervisors are nice. The only thing I really dislike is the commute. The board of elections is in downtown Cleveland, but on the edge of downtown, so I have to take two busses to get there. I live barely over 10 miles from downtown, a 20 minute commute by car, but between the bus rides and all the waiting around for them (since our local transit authority recently cut a bunch of busses from the routes) I have to leave a little after 8 in the morning just to get there by 9:30, and then I get off work at 5:30, and don't get home until nearly 7.

It's hard because I only have about two hours with the kids when I get home for baths, homework, etc. At least the position is only lasting about two months. Hopefully after that I'll be able to find a permanent job where I can get home earlier in the evening.