PTS 10

 

I have been wanting to participate in the Pillow Talk Swap on Flickr for a while now.  I've seen so many beautiful pillows made for each round, I had to get in on the action.  My chance finally arrived when I saw that sign ups were open for round 10.  Imagine my excitement when I saw that my partner was one of my favorite bloggers.  I already knew that she was a huge Anna Maria Horner fan, and in her mosaic I saw triangles, so that's the direction I decided to go in.  There is something about sewing triangles that I just love. 

I only had a few AMH prints in my stash so I ordered a charm pack of Field Study and Lou Lou Thi to work with.  I love the fact that AMH's charms are 6 inches instead of the usual 5.  I cut 60 triangles but ended up using only 25 of them.  Then I began playing with the layout.

 

 

This was ok, but ok wasn't gonna cut it.  It needed something more.

Enter some texty lovliness.  It was so fun showing teasers to the group throughout the process and getting such positive feedback.

 

Once the piecing was done I had to figure out how to quilt it.  I love free motion quilting but I wanted to push myself outside of my comfort zone so I decided I would attempt hand quilting for the first time.  I used six different colors of Perle cotton 8wt.  I also did not use any kind of quilting hoop or frame.

I must admit, I did pick out my stitches more than once due to uneven stitches.  Once I got in the groove though it went nice and smooth.  I did a simple petal motif in the center.

For the low volume background it took me forever to decide what to do with that area.  Finally I settled on simple straight line quilting that echoed the hexagon.  I did the colors by hand and then machine stitched the white with the perle thread.  I never knew you could do that but thanks to Little Miss Shabby, I discovered a new technique I will definitely be using again.

I really enjoyed making this pillow especially knowing who I was making it for.  I think it was pretty obvious that it was for her.  I wanted it to be special and I hope I achieved that.  Judging from her comments on Flickr I think she's going to be a happy lady.  I also made her a linen feather pouch and a wall hoop pocket but I forgot to take a pic of the hoop. :(

I cannot wait to see which pillow I receive!  There are so many beauties in the group I know I will love any one I get.

Thanks for reading!

Melissa