slytherin kitten pillow

and now, we enter the phase of christmas gifts.
i'm trying to catch up, i promise!
after having a lot of fun while making the slytherin hazel hedgehog pillow for a coworker that was leaving, i thought about the idea of making something similar for my roommate who is also a slytherin.
spoiler alert, i am also in the slytherin house.
since we are both slytherins and cat ladies alike, i figured this would be a perfect time to test out one of elizabeth hartman's "the kittens" quilt blocks.  i had bought the pattern awhile ago, and lisa and i had strong plans to make them one day, so why not give it a trial run and make a kitten?
i chose to use the "daisy" kitten, because i liked her two tone color scheme.
granted, she's two shades of green, but it was just enough to amp up her cuteness.
we have a gray couch in our apartment, so having the gray fabric in the background helped tie in with our current decor.  well... we also have a red couch... so i guess this helps keep things festive during the holiday season as well?
i kept the quilting simple to not detract from the cute kitten face. plus, a small little pillow is easy to knock out with a walking foot and a ruler!
i used slytherin fabric for the backing and made an envelope style closure.
if i was to do a pillow like this again i would consider doing a zipper backing, just to try something new.  having the slytherin fabric on the back helped tie everything together.
so now that i've made a slytherin kitten and hedgehog, what animal might be next?  ha!
pattern: the kittens by elizabeth hartman

slytherin hazel hedgehog pillow

i cannot believe we are officially in to october at this point!
it felt like it was taking for-ev-er for summer to end, and now here we are getting ready for halloween.  well... our apartment has had bits of halloween since stores started selling things in august.  no shame.  along with those fall/halloween vibes came this little guy!  we (the preschool staff) found out our awesome theater coordinator was leaving us for a new AMAZING job that she couldn't pass up at all.  ever since i made my civil war hazel hedgehog and she had commented on it, i knew someday i would make her a little something when one of us left the program for new adventures.  well... we found out on a wednesday and her last day was a friday.  oy!
two of her well known favorite things are harry potter and hedgehogs, so i couldn't help but combine them in the most perfect way.  i was at joann's anyways to buy a stamp pad and impulsively decided that this project NEEDED to be done.  she is all about those slytherins, so finding these two greens were PERFECT for his spikes with a subtle but coordinated harry potter themed background.  originally i got to the check out line with plans to make it a simple mini quilt that she could choose to hang on her wall, use as a mug rug, etc... but then i decided to transform this little guy in to a pillow!
i always forget how easy it is to transform things in to pillows.  my pillow form was a little big bigger than the "block" alteration in the pattern, so i added a few more inches prior to quilting and trimming.  cross hatch seems to be my jam right now - i did take a walking foot class and still have yet to bust out some new motifs on quilts... someday, right?
since i've also been in apron mode, i used my rolled hem foot to edge the two pieces for the back "envelope" portion of the pillow to give it a fancier edge.  i had originally purchased a different fabric for the back, but it clashed a bit too much color wise, so it found a new home.  i had the perfect amount to use this same fabric from the front on the back!
and here's that other fabric!
since she's a slytherin, i knew this fabric would be perfect.  sure, it is hidden inside, but should it ever need to get washed (she's also a cat owner) then she'll get a little peek at slytherin crest hiding inside.  the white with the tan just wasn't working for me.  i'm sure you'll all understand :)
now that i've made a hedgehog quilt and a hedgehog pillow, i feel very strong hedgehog making vibes.  i posted about wanting to make pillows to cover my apartment and everyone agreed there was no shame in that, including my roommate lorien.  my mom asked if i was going to make a hedgehog for each hogwarts house... and not gonna lie, that sounds like a lot of cuteness!  do i keep going with hedgehogs, or use a different elizabeth hartman animal for each house?  do i just elizabeth hartman our whole living room?
also, i appreciate our leaf covered patio REALLY amping up the fall vibes for these photos.
pattern: hazel hedgehog by elizabeth hartman

boba fett pillow pet

ok, i suppose calling this a pillow pet is not even accurate, but it was a good enough rhyme for me.
i've had this post drafted out and apparently set to post since august.  oops!
waaaaay back at the beginning of the year (pre-aileen wedding.  pre-aileen birthday even) someone on a facebook group was looking for someone to test a pattern for her star wars mini quilt swap.  when i saw the design, i knew i had to try it out for her!  she sent me the pattern after a few tweaks, and i went about bought the perfect shades of kona cotton to make this boba fett creation.  i used pieces leftover from aileen & ben's wedding quilt for the background around his head.
i knew that aileen would really have no use for a mini quilt, so i turned him in to a pillow cover.  i used the same type of tutorial that i did for the beauty and the beast themed pillows last year, and it turned out great!  he's a little larger than your average throw pillow, so hopefully aileen and ben will find a home for him.  even though ben apparently despises throw pillows.
pattern designed by: radioactive_squirrel
and there you have it! consider this a hopeful reboot to catching up on posting.

tale as old as time - beauty and the beast themed pillow set

when lisa started to jump in to the instagram swap game, it wasn't until too late in the game that the disney mini quilt swap was discovered.  such a shame.  i've joined and even organized a few disney swaps on craftster, and they're always a favorite topic to craft for.  so instead, i sat on the outside, checking the hashtag every so often, and oogling at all the disney quilt goodness.  on a random day, i cruised over to craftster and looked at the swap angel board just to see if anything looked fun.  and there it was, disney swap round 12 needed someone!  after a day-ish of thinking on it, i committed to the job and awaited to hear from the gal i'd be sewing for.  then, i found out she had been waiting since AUGUST... yikes!  they wanted a project sent out within two weeks, with a "large" item being one of the items (large = 3 hours or so to make).  my vision was born, and the ball was rolling.  she wanted something for her new house that wasn't cheesy disney.  i hit up fandom in stitches, found the perfect paper pieced patterns, and had kinkos blow them up 240%.  the next day, i bought my fabric, and two days later, i was spending my entire day paper piecing.
one of her favorite movies listed was "beauty and the beast" so i selected chip as well as the enchanted rose to turn in to pillow slip covers.  originally i was set on them being 12", but the smallest square pillow form i could find was 14" so i added a slight border to it.  on sunday i did BOTH of the entire blocks, start to finish, and prepared myself to get ready to do the quilting/sandwiching on monday.  i found that i didn't have any blue thread so i had to run to joann's that night (bummer) and then knocked out the remains of the quilting on both as well as the "envelope" portion of it.
i found a few tutorials on pinterest that described how to make these types of pillow covers.  my grandma had made them for years for my mom & aunt for christmas, so it was a good visual to take a peek at an actual one as well.  the ink used by kinko's was something awful, and left black marks all over the lightest pieces of each block.  so frustrating.  but after a date with a specific stain fighter for ink and a spin in the wash, they were good to go.  packed them up, and then they were shipped out on saturday.  less than a week start to finish, not too shabby!
she initially mentioned that she liked the enchanted rose as a good representation for beauty and the beast, and i have to agree!  i really love this block, whether for beauty and the beast or just to simply be a paper pieced rose.  i cannot imagine this at the 5ish inch size it initially was before i blew it up.
i thought this chip was a good "subtle" match to the rose pillow, as it wasn't a giant princess face.  he was a simple little block (i made him second after the rose) and it just powered right through.  i think he's a pretty cute little guy in movie form anyways, and would absolutely make this block again.  shoot, it has made me want to go through and make so many more disney blocks from their site!
after creating this pillow set, i've also started to envision what the types of friend gifts there might be for christmas 2015. i guess we'll have to wait and see if this stays as the inspiration, or something else happens, right?  either way, i am totally going to keep peeking in on the swap angel board.  as much as i love receiving things from other people, i just don't have anywhere to put anything right now!  but seriously, i'm sure i'll keep doing regular swaps as well.  and drooling over the awesome up! mini quilt from the disney swap that i missed out on.
it's pretty much fantastic.

erika's wedding - garters & ring bearer pillows

so in the midst of all the wedding planning for erika, she asked me about making two things for her big day.  her garter set & ring bearer pillow.  yet again, another adventure over to pinterest to start looking for different ideas & styles for everything.  after scrounging the fabric stores together for the right color fabric & ribbon, we were set for everything to get going.


the ribbon we found for her garters was a little bit pinker than the actual shades of fushia of the bridesmaid dresses, but we figured since it would be under her dress, it was good to go. 

as far as the pillow goes, we managed to find a fabric for the fushia that was almost idential to the swatch erika had in her purse.  after three different attempts with the top pieces trying to get them to lay flat, the final product went together super smoothly.  we found these super adorable star fish buttons on etsy that were exactly what we needed to tie in the beach theme in a classy but not overdone way in to her ceremony.