Here’s something you might not know about me: my car is a 1990 Mini Mayfair. Yes, we have a family car that’s modern and amazing that we use for the school run and visiting family and so on, but MY car – the one that makes me smile the second the engine starts – is this beauty.
I have always loved the way a Mini looks – rounded, glossy, friendly – and when I drove it, I realised how much fun it was. It doesn’t have a lot of power, but it’s so small and light that you feel like you’re speeding around even when you’re doing 30.
The thing that really makes me treasure the Mini is how it makes me feel. I bought it when my daughter was young and I was feeling that all-too-common post-baby loss of self: I was a mother, I was a wife, but I didn’t feel like a person. I wasn’t working, I didn’t have things that defined me without coming from other people. And that was really, really hard for me.
That’s what appealed about the Mini – it was a silly, frivolous thing. It wasn’t safe for a baby. It was too small for all of us to go in at once. It didn’t have electric windows, power steering, or even a fuel injection system. It was a thing only I would use, that wasn’t going to get claimed or borrowed or baby-fied. It was a place where I could be me.
So of course the very first thing I wanted to do was to personalise it. I upgraded the original tape deck to a modern stereo, grabbed a USB fob, and made carefully curated playlists of happy, upbeat, sing-along music. I bought a selection of brightly coloured yarn and crocheted a granny stripe blanket to brighten up the back seat, where nobody would ever sit.
And then I looked at it and thought… something’s missing. Yes, the blanket cheered up the interior, but it didn’t quite look inviting yet. I had visions of driving to a beautiful nature spot, parking up, and climbing into the back to crochet with the door open and fresh air streaming in. The back seat needed to look like a yarnie haven.
It needed a cushion.
So out came the scraps from the blanket and an extra hank of grey. I made small, simple, solid granny squares, and joined them with the grey. Then I worked granny rows on the back and added 7 brightly coloured buttons to close it.
NOW it looked finished. Cosy, colourful. Warm in the winter (the heating isn’t all that) and cheery in the summer. Perfect.
I named the pattern after the Mini’s original paint colour, which it still sports today: Henley Blue.
I never did get around to driving the Mini to a picturesque place for a spot of crochet, but it’s taken me to many a Knit Night and safely home again, and some might argue that’s better.
Henley
Crochet • Aran • FREE
Henley is a cushion cover that’s perfect for novice crocheters exploring basic granny techniques. The front is made up of small squares worked in the round and joined with single crochet while the back is simple granny rows worked flat.
