Having had one week at university Helen has decided she needs some crafts to keep her occupied, so while she was at home for Christmas she took herself off to Hobbycraft to make herself a ‘craftbox’. She came back with two cross-stitch kits, a decoupage elephant and a desire to learn crochet.

I suggested she borrowed my spare sewing machine and did some sewing and she has gradually come round to the idea, though we are going to have to get it serviced first so it will have to wait til her next visit home.

I made her an initial cushion for Christmas like the one I made for James and Tillie and it gave her the idea that maybe she could make a cushion.

I introduced her to pinterest and craftsy and she is now discovering how fast time goes when you’re on Pinterest!

I still had fabric left from the cushions so she decided on an elephant cushion. We spent a lovely afternoon in the sewing room together. I have a pattern for an elephant quilt which I’ll be making for her shortly so she traced the pattern from that. I showed her how to use Bondaweb and a tracing wheel, and she quickly had the elephant stuck on waiting to be stitched.

She had a practice at stitching in a straight line and then a practice at using blanket stitch round a shape, she was brilliant at it! She carefully went round the elephant in a pretty much perfect line, it’s not exactly a simple shape either!

Of course she wanted pom-poms round the edge, Helen doesn’t believe in making things simple! She stitched it in place before pinning all around and then stitching with a zipper foot to get as near to the bobbles as possible.

Helen’s cushion came out beautifully and by the time I came back from work the next day she’d made a Superman one for her boyfriend’s birthday!

She’s now looking into sewing classes in Birmingham!