Mother's Day crochet flowers

I have been working on creating a crochet flower corsage over the last couple of weeks. There is an abundance of patterns for this purpose-the crochet flower is more than well documented! However, I wanted something that was exactly right as I wanted a special flower for today- Mother's Day. 

I no longer have my Mum to give flowers to,  as she passed away three years ago now. Mother's Day was always such a special time for her-I think this went back to when her own mother was a parlour maid in service in the late 1890s-servants would be given the day off to go 'a-mothering'. Whenever we would journey anywhere on Mother's Day and traffic was busy, Mum would declare, 'Oh they're all off a-mothering!'.

Above is one of my favourite vintage photographs-my mother as May Queen, in 1932 aged 14, the year she left school. She always said the roses were so heavy she remembered almost dropping them!

I wrote a few months ago about how my mother of the bride outfit for my daughter's wedding was a tribute to Mum's wartime bridal outfit with  three carnation corsage. Mum loved flowers- her father had been a keen gardener and she too was green-fingered. Once when I was at primary school I came home and could not find her anywhere in the house. Finally I went out into the garden and located her in the greenhouse potting and planting, having completely lost track of time, like an artist deep 'in flow'! 

Roses were her favourite and she had the complexion of an English rose, so my Mother's Day tribute is a pretty rose corsage. The basic pattern I used can be found here. As I used 4 ply cotton and a 2.75mm hook with the measurements suggested the rose would come out a little small so I adjusted it starting with 75 chain-this gave me 36 delicate petals. When assembled the flower measures about 3in across, just right for a corsage.

My daughter spotted them and asked for one each for her Mother-in law and Grandmother-in-law. She chose the candy pink and lilac ones and I made a little gift box for each:

The gift boxes were made from the new Sizzix Bigz XL gift box die -it makes a cute box perfect for jewellery items etc. I decorated each with the birthday cards I made earlier in the year.

Finished off with a hand stamped tag and organza ribbon they were all ready to go:

Hope the two lovely ladies they are intended for enjoy them!

I always miss my own Mum but I am blessed in being a Mum myself and have had a lovely day being spoiled with flowers and books-my only dilemma is which to dive into first?

Hope you have had a lovely day!

Best wishes

Alison xx