Friday 19 March 2010

A little bit of everything...


In my now customary way, I couldn't resist making some cushions out of the scrap from Harry and Max's quilts.

Ages ago, I saw this great tutorial by Aneela at Comfort Stitching and knew that I would like to give it a go. It sat around in my head for a while and then the idea was born to make these cushions.  I have never 'lowered the dogs' on my machine before and taking off the foot took a bit of nerve.  I practised on some scrap for a while  ages until I found the confidence to put needle to fabric.



I'm really liking the scrappy, sketchy look to this.   A real departure from my usual standards of neatness.  There will be more projects like this in the future.



I had a ball with the bondaweb!  I found a fun font, which I enlarged then transferred to fabric.  At first, I tried machine embroidering it on to the scrappy panel, but it didn't really stand out enough so I decided to put into practice a new stitch I learnt at my embroidery workshop last Saturday.  (You can read about our day here and here!)  This is palestrino stitch - my new favourite! A natty little knotty number!



After embroidering on the initial, I lighty quilted the panel with some scrap batting and a bit of muslin, just to give it a bit of extra body.  The back of the cushions are made with the offcuts of the backings of the quilts, to which I added a little fun label to make the boys smile when they turn their cushions over.  I'm still loving Harry's little snail:



And Max has got a frog that featured on one of his fabrics!



The backs are simple envelope style, therefore eliminating the drama of zips and I used left-over binding to join front and back together.



With hindsight, the letter would have stood out more had it been done in a plain fabric, but that would have meant buying something when the idea is to be a scrap-busting project!



The cushion pads are from John Lewis and measure 30 x 40 cm.

I'm brimming with ideas for cushions now...

...uh-oh!





8 comments:

  1. Blimey, your palestrina is amazing!

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  2. Gorgeous cushions! I agree that your palestrino is amazing! I can just about straight stitch!!! x

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  3. How fab! The boys are going to love them.

    I did a machine embroidery class at the City Lit ages ago, and it was scary and liberating at the same time to be able to move the fabric so freely under the needle.

    And you must show me how to do palestrino--wow!

    K x

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  4. Oh, I love these cushions! I was just thinking today, now that I have conquered my walking foot, I must really try lowering the feed dogs and doing some free motion quilting. You have inspired me!

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  5. They are just beautiful. I love raw edge applique. It's my absolute favourite and when it has been washed a couple of times it goes all soft and fluffy. Perfect for these cushions.

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  6. I love the cushions!!

    (not to mention the neatness of your palestrina stitch... very impressed. You'll be teacher's pet next time!!)

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  7. they look fabulous - like you say the sketchy quality is a real winner and I'm hugely impressed by your beautiful stitching!

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