one down, two to go

it took me most of the day to figure this out. i combined two ikea fabrics from my stash and made a reversible pillow for the new lounge area in the covered terrace that husband has built this summer. i bought a pallet cushion as the base and so this is basically a cover, though i have sewn the buttons on, so i'll have to clip them off if i want to remove it. 

i spent quite a long time fiddling with the zipper. i was pleased with myself for finding a long zipper for only 10kr. in the local secondhand shop. maybe i won't bother with the zippers in the next ones since i'm sewing the buttons on. it makes quite a difference to have them there - it keeps its shape much more nicely.

i really love how the buttons look. i don't love the sawdust that i got on the brand new cushion because i couldn't resist trying it out in position and husband was still sanding the bench in preparation for painting it. 

prepped the buttons for the next two. i'm really pleased with how they turned out. and they look cool and i think they'll be quite flat and not uncomfortable to sit on them. at least these rainy weather is good for such activities. 

perlemagi!

after years of making "perleplader" with the child and never having them really hang together, i spent yesterday playing with hama beads. i saw someone doing very creative things with them a few months ago at upcomers in vejle and bought a couple of her how-to books. she calls her technique perlemagi.

her technique involves melting them much more than we ever melted them back in the day. luckily, i saved my old iron that was spitting chalky residue on all of our clothes. turns out if you turn off the steam, it's perfect for melting little plastic beads.

i went a little nuts. and couldn't stop making them. i even made husband eat smørrebrød for dinner, because i couldn't be bothered to stop and make dinner. it's kind of magical how these geometric shapes just melt like that. and how melting them this much makes them actually stick together. 

i made these as buttons for the cushions i'm making for our new outdoor lounge area. i needed 36 of them. it was fun. i could have kept going, but i restrained myself. ok, i did make a few extra, as i have to figure out how to make holes in them so i can sew them on. it was a great activity for a rainy day.