Reading Pillows

Earlier this year a friend had asked me to make reading pillows to sell in her shop. I tried to make one up as a sample to send her and I just didn't like how it turned out. I altered it a few times and no matter what I did it was not acceptable. 

With a craft fair coming up soon, I thought I would give it another shot. I had this idea to use up novelty fabrics I had lying around. So I picked out my half-yard cuts. I chose some camping-themed fabric for my first try and I had this idea to use my embroidery machine to make the front pocket.

I didn't use a big enough piece of fabric so I ended up adding a band to the top and bottom to make it large enough. It really gave it a nice finished look. 

I used a free online tutorial to make the pillow. It helped me determine the right sizes for the pieces. The only real change I made is instead of using fiberfill stuffing, I used a pillow form. That meant I had to make a overlapping back piece to insert the pillow form. I discovered that was what I needed to do to improve my original pillow. It was the lumpy-looking fiberfill that was unacceptable. The pillow form really made a difference. 

Even from the back, the pillow had a nice finished look. Now that I solved the quality control issue, I needed to make some more. I had so much fun matching embroidery files with my fabrics that I ended up making a bunch more so I went on Amazon and ordered a bunch of pillow forms. 

While looking through Etsy for embroidery files I came across the cutest bird file. I fell in love with it. And now that I'm gaining experience with my machine, I conquered this file with over 34,000 stitches. It took a few hours to stitch out but I sure had fun with the colors. I chose them from the colors in the Tula Pink fabric scraps I had leftover from a quilt I made last year.

I made this little beauty into a reading pillow as well. 

I will put this one up for sale along with all the others, however this one will be a little more expensive. I'm not so sure any of these will sell but if they don't, I can always ask my friend who owns the boutique if she would like to put them up in her shop. It feels like a good business plan.

Farmhouse Pillow Covers

I made some pillow covers to decorate the bench in my kitchen. I used my embroidery machine to embroider on some white linen. I used a nice farmhouse plaid to frame the embroidered pieces. I really like the look.

A Memorial T-Shirt Quilt

My daughter's friend Corina wanted a quilt made from her grandpa's shirts. When Corina dropped off the shirts, there were so many that I had to make two. The first one was made from dress shirts and was delivered in time to give as a gift before Thanksgiving. Right after Christmas I started on the second quilt from t-shirts and other knit shirts. There were even a few flannel shirts thrown in. 

Once it was finished, I looked at the stack of remaining fabric scraps and figured out how to make a pillow from one of the shirts. I used a 16" pillow form as a measurement to make the pillow cover. The buttons on the front became the opening to get the pillow form in. 

Leftover pieces from the dress shirts made a nice patchwork pillow cover, the cuffs were incorporated into the patchwork as well. I quilted the patchwork with some straight-line stitch-in-the-ditch quilting. 

Back in fall, Corina's daughter asked me if I could make her a baby doll quilt. I started it back in fall and sadly it never got finished. Then last week while cleaning up the sewing room, I came across it and finished it. I was happy to be able to complete it for her. 

I dropped everything off yesterday. Corina was happy with the extra surprises and glad to be able to gift the quilt and pillow to her grandma. 

Unicorn Pillow Cover

I embroidered a few samples just to try out my new machine. So now that I have these pieces, it seemed silly to waste them by letting them sit. I found some coordinating fabrics and the samples are now in the center of a pillow cover. I made the cover with a zipper closure so it can be removed and washed. Not that it's done, I wish I would have added a ruffle. I think that would have made it prettier. I think I will give it to Avery next time I see her. 

A World of Hearts

The quilt shop where I work wants to participate in the #aworldofhearts thing so my boss made up a pattern called Hearts in Windows. If a quilter is going to put a heart in their window, of course it will be made of fabric!

So she put her pattern and a kit to make it online and it blew up. She called the employees and in order to keep social distancing standards even while we are closed, everyone picked a day to come in to make the kits. So I make them on Tuesdays. It's crazy, she wants to keep a standard of making them from reds, whites, and blues, but we are running out of fabric to make them! So she is ordering more all the time. 

I decided to make my own from my stash so as not to use up a kit that can be sold to someone else. Here is my version:

Here's what it looks like hanging in my living room window. I used 3M Command removable hooks and safety pins to hang it.

The pattern is a pretty easy one-pager. I would share it with you but that would not be right. It is sold for $3.00 each and the money goes to a Racine charity affected by COVID-19. If you'd like to order one, check out this link: https://www.sewnsaveofracine.com/shop-online.

When I made mine, instead of making it a mini-quilt, I made the back so a pillow form could be slipped inside it after I take it out of the window. It will look just as good as a pillow on my wicker rocker as it does hanging in the window. 

Have a Heart Valentine Pillow

I fell in love with the Have a Heart pattern in the new issue of Quilts N More. I knew I could make one from my stash. It's always fun to be able to make that happen.

I spent the afternoon binge-watching The Ranch - season 6 on Netflix while I sewed. I love how funny the show is and how over the various seasons, they've pretty much had parts for most of the cast of That 70's Show. That was a fun series too.

The cute pillow is now resting on the sofa in the living room. Since I don't have much Valentine's decor, I'm happy to have this.

Flurry Blocks

I am making a bunch of "gift" blocks based on a pattern called Flurry. They are fun to make and I'm planning on using them for a pillow cover and a table runner. There are enough to make an entire quilt but I just don't want another Christmas quilt.

I think I will get a Christmas themed pantograph to use to quilt the pieces once I have them completed. I'm using my Sweetwater fabric collection to make these. I have two years' worth of their Christmas fabrics and I don't want to save them any more. It's time to use them for cute things! I've collected so much of their fabrics that I could make quite a few small projects.

Mini Charm Bench Pillow

I had some leftover charms from one of last year's Christmas projects and I thought this mini charm bench pillow cover would be a great project to use them up. I cut the charms into 2 and a half-inch squares and found some white linen to use for the sashing/background.

The tutorial I used for this project can be found here. Luckily I have 2 long bench pillow forms available to cover. It was so quick and easy I think I might make another one with everyday fabrics for after the Christmas season.

Gnome Pillow

This is a cute pattern I got at my local quilt shop. I used some Sweetwater Christmas fabrics I had on hand. I love Sweetwater fabrics so much, whenever they come out with a new collection, I have to get it. I'm happy to get to use some of this collection on such a cute project.

Fall Goodness

I've been admiring Cori Dantini's Fall Goodness fabric collection for a while. So I finally purchased the cute panel and some coordinating yardage of the fabrics.  My plan was to make a table topper and a pillow cover for the bench in my foyer.

I cut the panel into manageable pieces in order to make a square table topper. After adding sashing, I was pretty much done. I did the same for the pillow cover, just sashing and an outside border.

I bought a pumpkin pantograph just to quilt the table topper. It's hard to see in a photo, but it turned out really cute.

There's lots of fabric so I made some half-square triangles with the leftovers. I'm not sure what I will do with them. Since there's not a lot of contrast between the two fabrics, it's hard to imagine turning them into something usable. I think I was just sewing them together for something to do. Maybe if I leave them up on the design wall for a while, something will pop into my head. There's enough panel pieces left that maybe I just need a solid fabric to throw into the mix to help.

Gobble It Up Pillow

I recently purchased a new issue of Quilts N More Magazine. I bought it just to get this pattern. I thought it was so cute. And I liked the fabric that the designer used too.

Now that I work in a quilt shop I have a better knowledge of what's in the shop. As a customer I just went to get what I needed, I never really browsed much. I knew that my shop has the All Hallowed Eve fabric line which was used in the magazine. I purchased the brown and off white from the shop and used my scraps to complete the project.

It didn't take very long to complete. I even quilted it just like they did in the magazine. It always helps to make a project go quickly when I don't have to make the decisions, just follow the instructions in the pattern. Ha! Now all I need is the correct size pillow form and this one's ready for later this fall.

Valentines Pillow Cover

I had 6 leftover blocks from a Valentines quilt I made a few years ago. I took three of the blocks and added 2-inch strips of white fabric between them and ended up with a 15" x 29" panel. I added batting and a piece of muslin underneath, pinned the layers together to prep it for free-motion quilting on my sewing machine.

One of the ladies from my church quilt group came over to quilt on my longarmer today. I thought it would be a good idea to work on a small project to keep her company so I quilted the pillow cover while she was here. I also had enough time to make the back of the pillow cover. I used some leftover red Valentine fabric for the binding and finished the project by the end of the afternoon.

I purchased a 28" x 14" pillow form which fit the pillow cover perfectly. I like the result. Now I just need to figure out what to do with the other three blocks. Maybe I should make a table runner to match.

Christmas Holiday Pillow Covers

I made a few Christmas holiday-themed pillow covers this week.

For the Christmas tree pillow cover I used a tutorial from A Quilting Life's blog. The link to the tutorial is here. The thing you need to know about the tutorial is that the instructions are incorrect. For the background it says this: Cut (2) rectangles 2 1/2″ x 4 2/4″.
I should have recognized the sign that something was up when it read four and two-fourths. The correct cut is 4 3/4" not 4 2/4". The image she has on her blog is correct but the instructions are where is issue can be found. And of course I cut the wrong size first, luckily I had enough fabric to cut another piece correctly.

I free-motion quilted the pillow tops and used a cute red and white striped fabric for the binding on one and a red print with snowflakes for the other. The backing fabrics are cute Christmas prints from Joanns.

The 4-patch pillow cover was made using charm squares cut into 4 2 and a half-inch squares with 1 and a half-inch strips between the 4-patch blocks. They went together quickly and I like the results.

They sure brighten up my dark brown sofa.

The 'Joy' Quilt

Today I finished up the 'Joy' quilt and I made a pillow cover to go along with the quilt. Working with flannel is a challenge for me and to add fleece to the mix just made the project that much more complex. Let's just say it wasn't all that fun dealing with the stretchy-ness of both the flannel and fleece and then add some tension issues when trying to quilt through the fleece and it was a recipe for frustration. After having the thread break at least a dozen times (whenever I stitched through the fleece) I finally figured out the proper tension setting. I'm not really complaining as all things difficult are learning experiences but I'm certain I won't be doing another fleece project any time soon.

So here's to kicking off the holiday season with a finished quilt and a matching pillow cover. I hope my client likes the finished project. I do love how whimsical this little cutie turned out.

Shopkins Pillow Cover

My granddaughter, Avery just loves her Shopkins. I made her a little bag to hold her little toy Shopkins a few weeks ago and she asked me to make her a pillow out of the leftover fabric. The amount of fabric left was a pretty small amount which meant another trip to the fabric store for more. So I got another half-yard of the trade-marked fabric and whipped this up for her. It's amazing how these little things bring her so much joy and that only makes it that much easier to want to keep making them for her.

My Little Pony Pillows

My daughter is moving closer to us. She has until the end of August to get the move completed. Since she is going from an apartment to a townhouse, she now has the freedom to paint and decorate the rooms as she sees fit.

I volunteered to help her. That actually translates to I want to paint my granddaughter's new room purple and decorate with My Little pony stuff. She was happy for the extra help.


I purchased 2 gallons of Dutch Boy Dura Clean Satin paint in the color, Prairie Sky. I love this color. It is just the right shade of purple to meet my granddaughter's obsession with the color of Twilight Sparkle a.k.a. the purple pony. So I painted the ceiling white and then the walls. I was totally surprised when I only had to use 1 coat of paint. Even though the can did say it was primer and paint in one, I just never believe that claim. That meant I have way too much paint...a whole extra gallon. I predict many purple paint projects in my future.

After I painted, I made the girls some valances from 3 yards of My Little Pony fabric I purchased last year. I also made a banner to hang in their room. As soon as I have those things hung I will post about them here.

The leftover fabric went into making these two pillow covers. Each one has two pockets so the girls can put their little goodies in the pockets. They were so thrilled when they saw them. I was hoping to save them until they see their new room all done but I just couldn't wait.

Memorial Shirt Pillow Cover

A few months back I completed a memorial t-shirt quilt for an acquaintance. At her request, I took the leftover shirt pieces and turned them into pillow covers. Her plan was to give them as gifts to her sons and stepsons in memory of her husband however, she just could not part with any of them. And I made her 8 of them. So she requested 5 more. I incorporated pieces of a few different shirts into each pillow cover thinking that each piece of fabric might represent specific memories. Each rectangle is made from a piece of a polo shirt and the sashing was made from strips cut from a cotton oxford shirt. I think they will make a nice gift for any of her family members.

The Hope Doll

I made these squishy little pillow/dolls with a breast cancer survivor theme.  Appropriately, I named them Hope. If anybody needs one, just message me and I will get you one.

Recycled Denim Stuffed with Scrap Quilt Batting

After all the time spent sewing, planning, pricing, packing up and advertising for my church's craft fair, one would think I would take photos of my booth all set up.  But no, I did not. Even with my brand new craft racks ready for the show, I still didn't take the time to snap a single photo.  My excuse is that I was busy chatting with potential customers and making sales all day long.  Not a bad problem to have, but now it's over, and I can get back to normal or my version of normal until the next show.  Whew, I'm exhausted.

With that said, I've been a little burnt out so I took a week off of sewing.  Yes, a whole week. I don't think I ever did that before. I love my sewing room and my fabrics and making stuff.  I will admit that things were in quite a disarray during that last week building up to the craft fair. While trying to do some last minute crafts to sell, I just piled up the scrap fabrics and kept going. So much so that I didn't even post photos of those newer items. Instead I just kept cranking out more. Maybe I will post them sometime but for now, I'm thinking about organizing my fabrics and putting the ones I pulled out away.  There's something about order that makes me want to start again. We shall see if it works!

For now I do have this photo of an over-sized pillow I made out of denim scraps. I love recycled denim. I also discovered that I have a use for those scrap strips of batting that I cut off of finished quilts.  Yes, I have been saving them. I find it difficult to throw away perfectly soft, long strips of scraps even though they are so narrow that I cannot even use them in a potholder. So I cut those long strips into smaller pieces and stuff them into the denim pillows, stitch up the opening and pop them into the wash machine.  After one washing, the batting scraps seem to fluff and fill in the pillow nicely. Even though it is made of denim, it is amazingly soft and cushy. I just love how they feel.

Recycled Denim Floor Pillow

I also made sure the back pocket from a pair of those recycled jeans were placed in just the right spot - I think we can store the remote for the tv in there!

Quilted Stacked Coins Pillow Cover

Quite a few years back I made some patriotic quilts.  They were completed way before blogging and recording quilts digitally.  In total, I made three quilts out of red, white and blue fabrics. I used a postage stamp pattern to quilt them.  I donated two of them to a veteran's organization and kept the third for myself.  I thought it would be nice to take to the fireworks on Independence Day. After a few years, I lost track of that quilt only to discover that my son packed it in his things when he moved to California 5 years ago. 

While cleaning and sorting my fabric stash, I came across an old bin of remnants. In it was the leftover scraps from the red, white and blue quilts. Today, I would consider some of those fabrics outdated and never considering buying them now and others are so adorable I wish I had more.  So I took them all out and sorted through them and found some sewn strips.  So I took them and made them into a stacked coins pillow cover. 

After completing it, I found it a perfect spot on the front porch rocker.  Now that it has a place, I envision making a table cover for the bistro table on the porch as well.