Cushion crazy

This week I'm sharing more from the Yorkshire interiors shop of loveliness.  Our cushion detecting radar must have brought us here as we keep saying we need to buy cushions for all three of our grey sofas.  The easy, and more traditional way of doing this would be to choose two or three designs and stock up.  But I'm not always a fan of the easy route, sometimes that's a good thing and at others it just means more shopping than either of us are used to...

Stags and fishes

There was certainly plenty of choice here and while many were lovely, and there was the pom pom edging that I've been banging on about for most of the year, many were a bit too pastel and soft for what I was after.  The hare did seriously test me though, isn't it lovely?

we were tempted by the hare cushion
A badger to lean back on

It wasn't all just animals though, there were florals and multi-coloured bobbles. These were getting to more of what I had in mind, something full of colour that could be switched between our main living room and our conservatory, but even so we moved on.

brightly coloured flowers with silk tassel pom poms
A pug to share your chair

The fish cushions were admired, and they're quite obviously related to some of the cushions I've already shared.

fish and bobbles

And then, upstairs in one of the many rooms, we found our cushion.

The orange stag cushion came home with us

Yeap, the orange stag was ours and is now proudly living on our conservatory sofa. I suspect it's quite lonely out there as while we find the right cushions for the main sofa, we've requisitioned the black and white geometric patterned cushions (these ones which have already been promoted from the futon).  But putting these together give you an idea of the bold approach we're aiming for in the conservatory, the living room might be slightly more sedate, but who knows...

PoCoLo

Boxing hares

I've a bit of a thing for hares, what with our concrete versions in the garden and photos of this tambourine beating hare at Chatsworth, so when I spotted these Boxing Hares by Sue Lamb at RHS Hyde Hall in Essex on my recent visit, it was clear I was going to snap these.

Boxing Hares by Sue Lamb at RHS Hyde Hall

These are bronze resin and cost a little bit more than our concrete ones, but wouldn't they be great, and wouldn't they give the foxes a bit of a shock.

Love this #80: Mini seed tins

I shared a snippet of these on Monday, and told you how they played to my organisation obsession and my love of tins, which rivals that of notebooks.  And they're full of seeds too and while they're available from Suttons individually, it's better value if you're buying a few tins to opt for one of the two sets.  

A set of mini seed tins from Suttons Seeds

Individual tins are £4.95 each, but the salad or root vegetable collection of six tins cost £24.  That sounds a lot, and you're right it is a lot for seeds, but each tin has three packets of seeds in, so that doesn't make it quite so bad.

And of course there's six tins which look like seed packets, that could be used for things other than seeds.

RARING TO GROW

RARING TO GROW

I chose the salad collection and now have plenty of seeds for pak choi, spring onion, chard, lettuce, leaf salad and rocket.  Lucky that they're all things we eat plenty of, and the type of crop that I expect to grow more of once my new pots arrive (that's another story!)

The root vegetable collection contains two varieties of beetroot, two of carrot and two of radish, which might work better for you.  I suspect my tins will be around for a long time, and not necessarily always for seeds.

What would you use them for?

This isn't a collaborative post, I saw them, bought them and love them.  And that's without eating the evidence - yet!

“TheGardenYear