Well seriously I DO have a few more hours, so in my procrastinating mind I am way ahead!
The story of this pillow begins back in October 2009 when I saw THIS tutorial by Alison at Cluck Cluck Sew. I loved the pillow and the tutorial and made one for College Girl to match her sophomore year quilt. But I knew I wanted to do more with that same method. The mug rugs that I made recently were branching out from that pillow, using the free motion quilting to applique the shapes on to the background fabric. I liked giving the pieces some texture with the quilting stitches.
My idea for this month's pillow starting brewing back in January. I knew that I wanted a cherry blossom tree for March. My first rough sketch.
Yeah I sketch in a graph paper spiral notebook. I also draw out quilt blocks, quilt layouts, figure measurements for yardage and even cookie designs.
My refined sketch;
Notice how I can't even commit to an entire page? When I sketch the graph paper means nothing as far as size of the finished project, it is just paper.
I was determined to use what I had on hand for this pillow since I AM trying not to purchase fabric unless absolutely necessary. These are the Kona solids that I had in my stash that would work;
Although in my head a lighter, shimmery, sheer pink would have been lovely.
I didn't trust myself to draw the tree and sloping grass covered ground backwards onto the WonderUnder so I drew it out the way I wanted the end product, made notes on it and then flipped it over and traced around it on the WonderUnder.
I decided to use a pale pale pink Kona solid 'cloud' under all of the petals so that most of the area seen between petals would appear to be pink petals and not sky.
College Girl wanted to help so I set her to work with my Sizzix die cut press to cut out all of the petals. Neither one of us counted how many she made but I used them all. In fact she made one petal backed with WonderUnder and then I decided that was not going to work but late last night I ended up pulling the backing paper off and using that petal as well. I arranged them and rearranged them. I too pictures to see the placement from a different viewpoint. I used a Elmer's Washable School Glue Stick (in Disappearing Purple)to glue each petal down. I pulled up a few of the glued down petals and relocated them. Then I let it all sit overnight. I wanted to see if I would like what I saw in the morning.
I did! So I got to work with the free motion quilting. What I had envisioned for the grass didn't work out so I just started moving the fabric and this is what I came up with.
The tree bark was easy. I had done the trees on my mug rugs and really liked how they turned out so I just went with that same style. I used black thread to make the bark appear darker than just the brown Kona.
Free motion quilting of the flower centers;
I just went from blossom to blossom and cut all the threads when I was finished. MUCH quicker that way.
The finished pillow - Cherry Blossoms.
I left it on the couch after College Girl and I both took pictures of it and when hubby came in from work he said "CUTE PILLOW!".
I'm going to link up with amylouwho's Sew & Tell too.
Praise - for the new baby girl born into our church family!
Prayers - continued prayers for Joanne. She was to have surgery yesterday and her husband has not posted an update yet.
