Cricket Silhouette Cushions

It's 'Ho, ho, ho' time again, a monthly link up, organised by Celtic Thistle Stitches and Mud, Pies and Pins, to help get us all prepared for Christmas. For the last two 'Ho, ho, ho's', I made something for Maria (Clara and Nutcracker Doll), and something for Venetia (Vintage Embroidery Cushions), so this time I'd set myself the challenge of making something to tuck away for either Sam or Theo. Not the easiest challenge! Teenage boys are so much harder to make for than littler girls.

After quite a bit of thought, I decided that Sam could also really do with some cushions for his room, but cushions maybe aren't the most exciting present for a teenage boy. So I thought I'd at least make them a bit more appealing by making them cricket themed (Sam loves cricket). And after further thought I decided to personalise them even more by having 'Sam' himself playing cricket on them.

I found 3 photos from the beach with a little Sam figure in the background playing cricket - unfortunately the little Sam figure really is 'little' and not overly clear, I think these were very much more photos of Venetia dancing on the beach! 

So to be honest, it would have been more sensible if I'd waited and sneakily engineered some much better cricket playing photos - but maybe you know that feeling of having an idea and just wanting to carry it through straight away?! So, after some enlarging and switching of the photos, I had bigger, blurrier Sams!

And I used some bondaweb to trace these outlines, as best I could, on to some white linen scraps (scraps from some of the vintage embroideries I've used in fact!). And then machine stitched, in a darkish grey, all around each one a couple of times, also adding some detail (so they're not entirely silhouettes I suppose!).

I also added a red ball in this one (before I sewed down the white), although the ball does look slightly out of scale with hindsight! Despite that, I think this one is my favouite, I think it has the most 'flavour' of Sam!

The cushions are just simple, envelope cushions.

So if, like me, you have boys (or obviously sport loving girls just as much) you'd like to make something for, but are struggling with ideas, perhaps a sporting 'silhouette' might work for you too? If I'd waited to get better photos, I think it would have been great to do a series of 3 pictures of the bowling action in sequence, with the ball released in the final shot. Or a sequence of 'batting' action shots could be great too. The same kind of thing could work for golf, or I'm sure for lots of others like rugby or football. And obviously you could go for truer (and therefore easier!) silhouettes, possibly in black. I just went with white because I thought it worked for cricket, and then adding the detail kind of followed on from that.

So, one homemade present for Sam done. Theo still to go, and slightly lacking in ideas there so far!

This month's 'Ho,ho, ho' is over at Practically Pippy, who has made some gorgeous, Christmas mice, obviously right up my street and very cute, so take a look. And if you get your Christmas make linked up before the end of the month then you'll be in with a chance to win this month's giveaway.

I think this week generally may have a slight, cushion theme going on; I've made a few recently, mainly as presents, that I haven't got round to sharing here yet. So watch this space!

Sally.