Monday, January 16, 2017

A gifted pillow

This is the 5th year my guild, the Central Jersey Modern Quilt Guild, has thrown a January holiday party (December is wayyy too crazy), and I look forward to it every year. We vote in our new executive board, eat snacks, and run the Secret Quilter Gift Exchange. I've found my in-person quilty home with these ladies (so far we have no men, but men are certainly welcome!). It's a grand old time!


This year, my secret recipient was my friend Sonia @soniabegoniasonia (it's always the most fun when you get someone you already know well!). I greatly admire Sonia especially for her bag-making and garment skills, so I knew I was going to stick with what I know (read: quilts). Plus, she shares with me a love of Anna Maria Horner fabric, so it quickly became clear what I would make for her.


Instead of being super scrappy and possibly complicated, I decided a pillow with simple improvised strips would do the trick. Sonia loves a cool color palette like me, so I could easy just keep this pillow for myself! Heh. I didn't, promise. Some dense hand-stitching provide a unique texture to the strip sections (I even used some of my Loominous scraps here - Sonia should know that I REALLY love her!). I'm still fascinated by the combination of hand and machine stitching. This will be a theme in my work for a long time, I'm sure. I just want to try everything.

 

For the pillow back, I sewed up something only a fellow sewist can truly appreciate - an envelope backing made almost entirely of selvages. Even some really, super special Cotton + Steel ones. The selvages wouldn't be super comfortable on a pillow, IMHO, but you don't rest your head on that side anyway. It was so fun to pick and choose selvages based on her likes and the color palette.



Luckily, Sonia loved it! And I received a Hamilton (the musical) mini quilt and tons of little gifts from my friend Maggie, our webmaster and photographer (@squishythings - she also took the photos above for the @cjmqg Instagram account). I was so surprised and pleased! It's already hanging on my mini quilt wall. If you know the musical, you'll recognize the quilting around the star!


I've had a rule the past couple of years about swaps (in that I only participate in certain ones). This is one that's always at the top of the list, and I'm sure it will be for a while. Now my holiday sewing is *officially* over, haha!

Linking up to Fabric Tuesday, Needle and Thread Thursday, TGIFF, Crazy Mom Quilts.


5 comments:

  1. The selvages look fantastic for the back of the pillow; I can understand it not being the softest for cuddling, but it was a great touch for the back! This seems like a great swap each year, and congratulations on having all your holiday sewing (and gifting) successfully complete!

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  2. Love the idea of the backing for this pillow too! Our holiday swap/party is always the highlight of our guild! It's so much fun to take a few hours to chill out and be with people who love the same things!

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  3. Such a cute pillow! I love the combination of prints and colors and the hand quilting adds the perfect touch!

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  4. I get many information about the Change Your Life and i appreciate your work.

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  5. I LOVE LOVE LOVE my pillow!!!! I can tell you totally thought of everything I love - fabric, hand stitching, selvage, colors, etc! It looks amazing on our family room couch! Thanks so much!��
    Love,
    Sonia

    ReplyDelete

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