First of all, thank you for all your wonderful comments and emails about my little pillow project. I guess I'm not the only one that fell in love with this colorful design! Many of you asked for more direction on how to make your own. Here's the scoop on how I made mine. It's very easy and some of you may find a better/easier way.
First, you need to draw a pattern. This part may scare you a bit, but I assure you that anyone can do it! The best part of the drawing is that it's imperfectly perfect. You can't make a mistake!
First, you need to draw a pattern. This part may scare you a bit, but I assure you that anyone can do it! The best part of the drawing is that it's imperfectly perfect. You can't make a mistake!Here's my drawing. I made a 20" pillow and wanted an 18" flower. I drew an 18" circle to give me my outer boundaries. Start in the center with a 1" circle. Echo the circle and draw 4 petals around it. Continue drawing petals around and around simply echoing the previous row and getting a bit larger as you go out from the center. When you reach the boundary, you'll need to make some smaller petals to fill in the gaps.
Here's a better picture of how to start. Just draw quickly and without too much fussing about how each petal looks as long as they're kind of echoing the previous one. You can see in the picture above that I then numbered each one, starting in the center and working out concentrically. I had 72.
Then grab a pile of scraps, big prints, small prints - anything goes - and some fusible web. Flip the pattern over to get the reverse and draw each petal onto the paper side (a light box helps). Fuse to a scrap of fabric, cut out. Place the background over the right side of the pattern and put your petals in place (a light box helps here too). I started in the center and worked around drawing and fusing about 12 at a time.
For the stitching, I layered my top with batting and a piece of backing. You can do any type of stitching around each petal - blanket stitch, straight stitch, zig zag. I wanted a kind of funky look - so I went with a small zig zag and very fine 50 wt. Aurifil thread in light yellow. The width was 1 and the length was 1.5 for the zig zag on my Bernina. The stitching tacked down the pieces and quilted it at the same time.
I added some cording in the seam for the pillow. It's the gray and white scallop stripe from Ruby.
The back is a 15" square with some 1 1/2" strips added log cabin style.
There you have it! Feel free to comment or email me if you have any questions.
Here's a better picture of how to start. Just draw quickly and without too much fussing about how each petal looks as long as they're kind of echoing the previous one. You can see in the picture above that I then numbered each one, starting in the center and working out concentrically. I had 72.
Then grab a pile of scraps, big prints, small prints - anything goes - and some fusible web. Flip the pattern over to get the reverse and draw each petal onto the paper side (a light box helps). Fuse to a scrap of fabric, cut out. Place the background over the right side of the pattern and put your petals in place (a light box helps here too). I started in the center and worked around drawing and fusing about 12 at a time.
For the stitching, I layered my top with batting and a piece of backing. You can do any type of stitching around each petal - blanket stitch, straight stitch, zig zag. I wanted a kind of funky look - so I went with a small zig zag and very fine 50 wt. Aurifil thread in light yellow. The width was 1 and the length was 1.5 for the zig zag on my Bernina. The stitching tacked down the pieces and quilted it at the same time.
I added some cording in the seam for the pillow. It's the gray and white scallop stripe from Ruby.
The back is a 15" square with some 1 1/2" strips added log cabin style.
There you have it! Feel free to comment or email me if you have any questions.Oh, and someone asked if it was a gift or for me. It's all mine! But my daughter loved it too, so I have a feeling we may be making another one over the Christmas visit!
