Pillow Pop - Project #1 finished!

Amanda from Little Treasures by Amanda started a sew-a-long for the Misfit Quilters. She chose the Pillow Pop book by Heather Bostic. I purchased my copy from Amazon and I love all the projects in it!

She chose the first pillow is called "Life Aquatic" designed by Heather Bostic. (All the pillow designs in this book are not by Heather. It is a compilation of projects from many wonderful designers.) Heather's pillow was made with aqua and orange fabric scraps. Originally, I planned to make mine using a different color scheme, but when I went through my scraps I realized something. I think aqua just might be my favorite color. My blue bin of scraps was overflowing. Literally. So I decided to throw caution to the wind and just copy everything Heather did. No shame, right?

Here is my pillow top after I sewed all the squares together. I wasn't really sure about it at this point but I continued on. After I had the top quilted and it was assembled with the back I really loved it! It's funny how a little simple quilting can change something entirely.

This is my finished pillow. It now lives on my couch and has already been used in a few pillow fights and licked by my dog.

Next month (which is actually tomorrow, I guess. What happened to February?!?!) we will be starting a pillow designed by Katy Jones, who makes super awesome stuff! Want to join in our projects? It's not too late. You can join in anytime. We'd love to see your finished pillows!

Helping Friends

A friend and fellow Misfit recently participated in a swap and had a rather rotten experience. Sometimes things like that happen I suppose, but I couldn't help but feel awful for her. I'm not going to go into any details about what went on, but suffice it to say that I was afraid that the doll quilt she received might possibly be a source of bad feelings for her. I wanted to make something to replace it. Something she would be happy to hang on the wall, to remind her that there are nice people in the world who really care about her.

I started chatting a bit with Amanda about getting some of the misfits to possibly make a block and send them to me. Of course, many of them jumped on board. This is such a great group of women who are always willing to help others. Amanda put together a tutorial for the block we would use (we settled on the Ohio Star block). We did a teensy bit of stalking to find out her favorite colors, and before long, I started getting beautiful blocks in my mailbox.

This was the block I made

Then I got several more

And this was the finished product.

I happen to know that she loves vintage sheets as well, so I used part of a vintage sheet I had for the backing.

 

We all signed our blocks so that Amy would know where they all came from. These blocks came from all over the U.S. and even one block from Tasmania! How awesome is that?!?! I am so happy to know all of these wonderful, generous ladies and I am happy to call them my friends.

Getting Back to Work

I was out of town this last weekend (Yes. Again. It's getting ridiculous, isn't it?). I was house sitting for my in-laws while they went to Canada. Really I was just playing gardener for a few days, which I didn't mind one bit. The weather was perfect and it was a really relaxing weekend. I have been so behind on my sewing so I decided to bring my machine along and a few projects to work on.

The first thing I needed to finish was my little stack of trees. These are for the latest swap for the Misfit Quilters group. I really love how they turned out. I can't wait to get my trees in the mail to put my little quilt together! I used one of my favorite fabrics from the Sunkissed line by Sweetwater fabrics, and Kona snow for the background.

The next project that was overdue was for my friend, Sharon. She needed some people to help out making some blocks for a Project Linus quilt. She designed her own blocks with a tutorial here. These turned out really cute. I'm excited to see the entire quilt top to see how all of the donated blocks come together. Sharon has a fun blog that I really enjoy reading. Go check out all that's going on over at Craizee Corners.

I have been working on a sample quilt for the shop using Tula Pink's newest line Prince Charming. I got the quilting finished over the weekend and got the binding done last night. This was the first quilt I made using my new Bernina. The BSR foot made quilting this so much easier! It was a bit difficult to get used to, and I'm still learning, but I love it.

It is also almost time for the kids to go back to school. September 1st is the big day over here. I don't get why they'd start the school year on the Thursday before Labor day. They go for two days and then have a 3-day weekend... Anyway, I like to send gifts for the teachers with my kids on the first day. Apples are the usual thing and I'm unsure where that tradition started. I think I'll have to find out about that. I decided that teachers are probably sick to death of getting apples so I chose to make something else. Our school mascot is the Scottie Dog. I have been making these little guys for the kids to bring. I hope they are original enough to not be tossed in a drawer and forgot about until it's time to clean the desks out next June.

I am feeling pretty accomplished these last couple days, despite several hours of car travel and having a day job. I have two new quilts to list in the Etsy shop tomorrow too! Yay me! Now if I could always be this productive...