Bubbles Felted Cushion Pattern

This textured cushion is super-easy, once you have done the maths. You have to do maths, I'm afraid  because I don't know how much your wool will shrink during felting, nor how big your cushion is. Anyway, the maths is super-easy as well. You MUST use pure wool, not superwash. 

Your first step is to make a gauge swatch. I hate swatching as well, but it is necessary, first of all to see if you like the fabric you end up with but also so you can figure out the right size for your cushion. To make your swatch use the main pattern, which is:

Co 1

Kfb

K1, kfb, k to end every row until the desired width (the distance between the first cast on stitch and the live row you are knitting will be the unfelted width)

K1, k2tog every row until 2 stitches remain

K 2 tog

For the swatch I recommend making it 15 cm wide. I used needles 1.5mm bigger than recommended by ball band (well I say that, the yarn was some pure wool I have knocking about with no ball band, but would normally knit it on 5mm, I used 6.5mm)

Felt the swatch. I did this by washing in the machine at 90 with detergent, no conditioner, and some jeans and towels that wanted washing anyway. Measure the felted swatch and do the maths, e.g.

felted swatch = 10cm, finished cushion to be 30 cm. 30/10 = 3. You need to knit 3*15cm = 45 cm.

Remember - you can always cut the felted piece down if it's too big, but you can't make it bigger if it's too small. These measurements might not work out with your wool, so swatch!

Knit your square to the size you just worked out, using the pattern above

Then you need buttons, coins, or something else small and round. I used buttons and scattered them randomly, then used crochet cotton to tie them tightly with the knitted fabric stretched over them. In retrospect, it would have been sensible to have used a cotton that was a different colour to the yarn.

Then, with buttons firmly tied in, put the square in the wash to felt.  Again, I did it at 90 with jeans and towels (make sure your jeans are OK to wash at 90, obviously!).

Once the square is felted, while still wet, snip the cotton and ease out the buttons. This is quite satisfying. you might need to pop the bubbles back out once you have eased the buttons out.

When dry, trim down to size and make a back for it with some fabric (I put a zip in mine, but you could sew the cushion in there if you prefer). I cut out the fabric bigger than the felt square, cut in half, inserted a zip at the halfway cut, then put the back and felt right sides together, sewing about 5mm from the edge of the felted square (make sure the zip pull is inside what will be the cushion) then trimmed the excess fabric off with pinking shears.

Turn right side out, poke out the corners, insert cushion, zip up and admire your handiwork.