my last pillow

As the year comes to a close so does the Pillow Swap Four Seasons. This swap started two years ago as an idea shared by Sandra at Hohenbrunnquilterin (Munich, Germany) and myself to bring a little bit of seasonal cheer into our homes and the quilting/swapping community. We envisioned the group as a forum to share creativity and help with the sewing/pillow-making process.

We met a lot of really great ladies who participated in the group, shared their design-making process, and delivered amazing, excellent quality decorative pillows. It was a wonderful experience! I know I am repeating myself from my previous post, but I am going to miss this group!

I wanted to share the last pillow that I made in the group for my partner, Andrea.

Sneak Peek of Last Pillow

A lot of time and thought usually goes into my pillows, quilts and designs. I generally design specifically for my partners or recipients, because I want them to be happy and enjoy what I have made for them. Sometimes, I get it right, and sometimes I totally miss it. That can happen. : ) For my last Pillow Swap Partner, I decided to go with her inspiration mosaic completely and picked one pillow in particular which she had also posted on a previous mosaic for another swap. Can you guess which one it is?

Since my partner loved traditional red and green for Christmas, I knew my direction and wanted to complete the design with a scrappy look.

Starting Fabric Palette

I still had some lovely Kate Spain Charms as well as "Evergreen" leftover from last year's pillow that I made for Rosemarie in our swap.

Double Cathedral Window Pillow for Rosemarie - PS4S 2015

I analyzed the design from Andrea's mosaic and recreated it with EQ7 - my great program to design quilts and print paper piecing patterns. I have the full-blown designer version, but there is a new, mini program on the market which costs half as much and is great for beginners and newbies wanting to design quilts - EQ Mini. The Electric Quilt Company is always having sales, so you can usually find great deals too. If you live in Europe/Germany, I am thinking about providing training classes to those of you who have the program and want to learn how to use it. : )

Here is the design recreated by me. I do not know who to credit for this design; there was no credit information on Andrea's collage. If you know who originally designed it, please tell me, so I can give credit where credit is due.It reminds me very much of the first pillow I made in our pillow swap in 2015.

Framed Kaleidoscope - Recreated in EQ7

I didn't want to use white fabric in this pillow, but decided on a shimmering, metallic Essex Yarn Dyed Linen that I bought from the Fat Quarter in the summer instead. Please be careful when ironing any RK linen fabrics; they have a tenancy to shrink if your iron is too hot. Some of you know I don't like to iron my fabric too much....I like a warm iron without steam when pressing my patchwork. For straightening my fabrics and getting rid of creases, I use steam but I still use a warm iron. I actually have a non-steam iron that I use when creating patchwork.

I don't normally pre-cut fabric templates when foundation piecing, but when you try to make those scraps work one more time, you get a little creative.

My Chaotic Mess when Creating

The sixteen 4 1/2" FPP (foundation paper-pieced) blocks were made in a couple of days. I was extremely early making the pillow, but I knew I had a lot of appointments in November. I felt really good about the way it was coming together.

16 - Four and One-Half Inch FPP Blocks

Although the design is scrappy, I decided to keep a unity in the middle with two green triangles and two white/silver triangles. It created a slight challenge in the end to balance the entire pillow top and still maintaining the unity of the center squares.

Keeping in mind, I only had one FQ of Robert Kaufman Essex Yarn Dyed Linen, I had to precut my strips to make sure I had enough in the end. This is probably one of the first times, it actually worked too.

As for most pillows, I love the look of piping especially in a contrasting color. I thought this pillow would look lovely with piping as well. I always have a bit of trouble when making piping. I know I should make 1 3/4 inch piping from bias strips, but I am too frugal. I make straight 1 1/4 inch piping and always get myself in a pickle when trying to apply it to the pillow top. I know there is a tool out there too for cutting your piping to exact size after it is made, but again, I am too frugal.

On to the quilting...I used a clear mono filament top thread and polyester white bottom thread and stitched in the ditch. Usually before quilting, I sandwich my top, batting (fusible Pellon 987F thin) and a white inexpensive (IKEA) cotton fabric. I increase my stitch length to 3.0 from 2.5 standard on my Pfaff 2046 Quilt Expressions.I opted to quilt in the ditch to really let the design come out.. That lovely "hand-stitching" is a special quilting stitch on my machine. I have tried numerous times to get it to work for me, but it never would.

**Stitch #27 is a traditional hand quilting stitch.**
To achieve this look correctly, you will need to use clear mono filament on the top and a thicker thread on the bottom. Decrease the tension on your spool about 1/16 to 1/8 of a rotation or five degrees counterclockwise if you can do so on your bobbin spooler of your machine. The red thread you see is actually the bottom bobbin thread....not the top thread. The top thread is clear and becomes invisible on the linen.

Machine Stitching all the Way

For the back of the pillow, I decided to go with a cute pin-striped fabric with traditional red/green. I love striped fabrics and usually save them for binding or piping, but this looks terrific too.

Back of Pillow with Covered Zipper

The stripes got a little wonky in the end when putting in the zipper, but still matches (for the most part).

Covered Zipper and Matching Pin-Stripes

So there she is ladies and gentlemen. You can start to see just a bit of the shimmering fabric from the front in the previous photograph, but it sparkles so much more in natural lighting. Sorry I couldn't capture it better.

The Full Monty - Christmas Framed Kaleidoscope Pillow for Andrea

It was really a pleasure sewing for Andrea. I didn't put myself under pressure when sewing this pillow and allowed ample time to finish. It takes time to make beautiful, quality items. It makes me happy to sew for others and to warm their hearts. I think Andrea enjoyed the pillow as well.

Happy and Safe Holidays everyone! May your days with family, friends, or quality time for yourself bring you peace and joy. We'll see each other next year!

Hugs,
Karen

pillow swap four seasons - a wonderful experience

Hi everyone! The closing round of Pillow Swap Four Seasons is coming to a close. All pillows have been shipped and more than half have been received. I have to admit too, I have gotten very sad over the last few weeks, because our group is breaking up. Sandra (hohenbrunnquilterin) and I decided not to extend the swap another year. We had two very successful years of designing and quilting pillows for one another four times a year for two years in a row. Instead of going out with a whimper, we wanted to go out with a bang!

These last two years have been really incredible, too. I never imagined to have met such warm and loving women who share exactly the same interests as I do. I am ever grateful for this exchange of knowledge, skills, friendship, camaraderie, as well as warm hearts and pure love from each and every participant in our group.

It is not easy running a swap. Some of you out there know what it takes to be a swap mama, because you are one. It takes a lot of time, energy, and organization as well as people-person skills and flat out patience. The organization was never really a problem for me, but my soft skills could be better. I am not a fluffy person and sometimes get down to the nitty gritty pretty fast. I know this is a major failure/negative point about me. I know it and try to change this behaviour when I think about it. Sandra, the real leader of this swap, on the other hand has magnificent soft skills. She is what held this group together, especially when my fluttered brain didn't see things clearly, she knew exactly what was going on. An incredible thank you goes out to you, Sandra! Thank you for helping me through these two years by keeping me straight especially when I was wrong.

A big thank you to all of my the people whom I wrongly accused of not shipping on time too or mixing up names of people who sent me a pillow. Man, am I a total idiot when I insult a quilter by thanking someone else; I did that!! Of course I apologized, but it didn't make it any better, from my side that is. I think she took it much better than I would have.

Sometimes I got a little disappointed when I received a brief thank you in the headlines of a posted photograph of my received package. All a lot of thought went into every pillow I designed especially  for each partner I've had. Although I like to incorporate a bit of me into my designs, most of the pillows were truly drawn from the inspiration mosaics from my partners.

Here are all of the pillows made over the last two years for my partners:

Spring 2015 for Dorrie

Summer 2015 for Rita

Fall 2015 for Bettina

Winter 2015 for Rosemarie

I learned how to sew a covered zipper, make covered button, make a double cathedral window, learned about color value, understood the power of scraps.

Then there was 2016....

Spring 2016 for Julia

Summer 2016 for Sabrina

Fall 2016 for Ines

Winter 2016 for Andrea (Stay tuned for more photos.)

I learned my style and how to use contrast to make a design pop. I learned how to make two different kinds of piping - cross grain and bias as well as keeping my stash stocked up...you always have to be ready for the unexpected.

Then I helped making some angel pillows...

2015 for Astrid

2016 for Wendi

I learned the rainbow colors and starting using their color order to influence design.

And then there were those two special pillows I made for Sandra (hohenbrunnerquilterin)...

2015 - Winterverwirrung

2016 - Playful Plus

I learned that I could stitch in the ditch without it looking terrible. And I learned how to make foundation paper piecing to my advantage.

So over the last two years, I have extremely improved my pillow making skills! I even learned how to make buttonholes (but still needs a lot of practice. I learned that I love piping and dislike binding on my pillows.) I also love a covered zipper to keep everything nice and tidy inside. I learned to make a pillow just a little smaller than the size of the insert to make the design stand out better.

Once again...I am going to miss everyone from this group! Thank you for your kindness and your support. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all!

Rainbow Peel-iscious

And that is a wrap for this gorgeous pillow... I decided to go with a little rainbow piping. From each of the Lecien L's Modern Basic charms used in the pillow plus a couple others to fill in the gaps, I cut a 1 5/8 inch strip and connected them on the straight grain. Normally you would use a biased piping, but I had to work with what I had. Otherwise, I wouldn't have had much fabric to work with if both sides were cut off diagonally. That purple corner was a little tricky, because I actually started sewing after that corner instead of before the corner, but I managed to get it together.

Working with Robert Kaufman's Yarn Dyed Essex Linen is a dream. I first used it when I designed and made the "Countdown to Christmas" Advent Calender last year for the Fat Quarterly. I am not sure this E-Zine publication is still available due to a conflict of interest of international trading zones.

I do have one word of advice about it though. Do not iron it too much or at a high temperature. IT WILL SHRINK!

As far as the back of the pillowcase, I wanted to make a hidden zipper but thought about an interesting element of having the zipper stand out. I used a little red fabric leftover from the front of the pillow for a zipper end on both sides. I used the fake Sashiko stitching from the from and top stitched the zipper on both sides. It doesn't look as good as the front and I had to figure out why. I used a very thin polyester bobbin thread when appliqueing the orange peels on the front. When top stitching the back, I used 100% cotton for both the top and bottom threads. This diminishes the effect.

Because we have had such nice summer weather this year, I wanted to get out and take some pretty location photos. These are my favorites.

Sitting in a Windowsill

Hiding in the Pumpkin Patch

This pillow was really fun to make. I brushed up on my applique skills again which I need to do every now and again. I like the radiation of color from the center outwards too. I will not be keeping this one, although I really want to make a pillow for me or for my family. (I have an idea.) This is a very special "angel" pillow for someone who did not receive one in the summer round of Pillow Swap Four Seasons. I regret to say, it seems that every round something happens to one of the pillows or one of  the participants. I really hope the new "owner" will like it. : )

Thank you for dropping by!

the all-knowing eye pillow

I have been totally enjoying my sewing time lately. Yes, that's true. I haven't been blogging, and there is so much to share with you. I have participated in swaps, made several pillows, gone on a retreat, had major (non-sewing) down time....Life is good! The beautiful Rike from Stuttgart asked me to post about my sew pixel play and especially the pillow I was working on for the #PCSwapAS swap organized by littleislandquilting and @imasavonasic. So, here is the juice (a juicy read) about how I came up with the pillow. : ) Grab a cup of coffee or a fresh tea to read all about this wonderful design. You can make one too!

My (secret) partner for the pillow swap liked the fabric designers Jennifer Sampou and Jen Kingwell; this was filled out on her registration form for the swap. I had a charm pack of Shimmer 2 by Jennifer Sampou (because I do love her fabric!), and thought I would start there. I wanted to make a simple design and designed these two pillow tops in EQ7 using Jennifer's fabric collection.

These two designs were my starting point.

Criss Cross Tumble

Windmills

Both of these designs appealed to me as far as simplicity and color; I like it simple. I was ready to start my project and looked up my partner one more time on Instagram to see if I could find out some more information about her tastes and style. Then I read in her caption that she was the former editor of a patchwork magazine. My heart sunk. My simple designs were not going to impress her, I thought to myself. She is used to something a little more cutting edge. Okay. Time to get the ol' thinking cap on. I thought about it for a couple of days and this idea jumped into my head.

My starting point - Design - Fabrics

I opened my charm pack and separated the colors into lights and darks. This collection is quite even, so it was a little tricky to get the right amounts. I started cutting one-inch squares with my handy grid ruler. I layered a few, but since the fabric shifted a little, and I was cutting rather small, most of the squares were cut out individually. I arranged them onto a fusible fleece with the lighter fabrics towards the middle to make a shadowed sphere or eye. I tried not waste the fabric on the outer circle that were not needed. Since this sheet measures over 24 inches, I ironed small sections of fabric at a time. This was probably the most difficult step. : ) It did drop once (or twice) on the floor.

Starting with over 24" of fusible fleece and 1" squares

After everything was ironed and set in place. I sewed in rows just as outlined in the Sew Pixel Play Tutorial. I ironed all seams open and had no concerns with the seams opening since I sewed with a smaller stitch length. My advice is to turn off your steam, otherwise you will get burned. (Experience!) You do not need a small iron, just one without steam.

Ending with half of what I started with!

The next step hurt a little - to cut the circle, but it really looked nice in the end. Not all of the edges were cut off that had fleece showing, but they would be covered by the next fabric in the seam allowance. So much work and now I was cutting it all apart. ; (

Circle cut

The first phase was now finished. It turned out exactly the way I wanted it to. : ) Now onto the tricky "improv" part. I drew out on full 18" piece of paper what I wanted to achieve. I erased and re-drew until I got my circles just the way I wanted. (This is what I call "controlled improv.") I tried to use EQ7, but it just wasn't doing what I wanted it to do. This is a total lack of operator error!! I did print out the inner circles from EQ7 though.

Phase Two begins

After my center circle was finished, I cut out and labeled the rest of the sections and template carefully and traced onto the correct fabric with a 1/4" seam allowance. I sewed them together in full circle sections. The inner part sewed together perfectly. I had to work a little more on the outer part to get them a little more even. My 1/4" seam allowance was not that accurate. Granted with improv, it doesn't matter that much, but I was trying to achieve exactly what I had envisioned and what I had drawn out.

Sewn together in sections with templates

Goal achieved. It worked! As with most steps throughout the creation process, I usually sew something together in the morning and hang it up somewhere in the house. I look at it, analyze it, re-think it, and modify in my head. After a couple of days, I move on to the next step. This is where I stopped and thought the most. The inner ring was not jumping out enough and the yellow was blending in too much with the linen.

Pillow top sewn together

I decided to throw in a bit of hand stitching around the inner circle to make the eye come alive. I hand-traced over the seam allowance from the inner circle with a Frixion pen and bought some matching cotton floss. Which one do you think matches the best? I think I used the bottom one.

Time for some hand stitching

I finished with the hand stitching and machine quilted the rest of the pillow with matching threads. If you haven't noticed yet, there is no batting in this pillow. I (think I) used a fusible fabric on the backside of the main pillow top. I didn't want it to be puffy.

I used a large echo quilting outlining the eye on the linen fabric as well. You have to look twice to know it is really quilted. : )

Quilting

The top was finished - onto Phase Three - the back. Now, I could have done a simple backing with zipper, but I wanted to show off with some fabric manipulation. I took some of the backing fabric and folded it into thirds as well as strips from the linen. I inserted the blue into the linen so no seams were visible. I top-stitched the blue strips in place with blue thread on the top and linen on the bottom.

Making accent insert strips for the back of the pillow

I made six or seven of th inserts and debated about how long they should be. I didn't want them too short or it might be too puffy when it sits on a sofa. I cut them to about five inches long, twisted, and basted to the other fabrics before assembling. It is a quick accent to really make a "wow" on any patchwork piece!

Top portion of the backside

And after sewing both sides together, this is what you see. Now doesn't it look better with the accent hand stitching around the center eye? I think so! I also asked a few people if I should put piping around the pillow. I love piping, but I think it would have ruined the design of drawing your eye into the middle or to the corner rather.

"Das Auge der Weißheit" - Front

And if I were to do this back a second time, I would either make the inserts shorter, or make the zipper so it would fall in the middle rather than at the bottom. : )

Back of "Das Auge der Weißheit"

And because I wanted to make something to match the pillow, I made a cute little mug rug too. This time I cut out 3/4" squares instead of one inch, and they were reduced to just 1/4" after both side seams were sewn. Here is a photo of just the columns sewn and pressed open. I think I like the idea of long bricks, and think I will try this once withe pixel method.

All columns are sewn and pressed

I cut out another circle with my handy-dandy (cheap inexpensive) circle cutter. I think this circle measures about 2 1/2 - 3 inches. I don't quite remember. It must be that lack of estrogen. : )

Two and one half inch pixelated circle

I wanted to create the same type of eye on the mug rug and wanted to make rings around it as well. I started with cutting a whole in a charm square slightly smaller than the original size. This method did not work!! Although I tried twice, it was just not the right technique.

A very daring technique that didn't work for me.

Then I remembered seeing this great tutorial from Allison at Campell Soup Diary for her Freezer Paper Drunkard's Path. This would be an excellent way to use it. I appliqued right over the freezer paper and left the paper inside. I cut some of it back later.

The freezer-paper method worked like a dream.

I layered the circle until I got a similar pattern as the orginal. I loved to watch it grown. I think I should have stopped here. What do you think?

And here is the final mug rug...

Matching mug rug

I used a simple single-fold 1 3/4" binding and machine stitched in the ditch to keep it in place.

There is just no comparison to the original pillow though. I think the framing in the blue totally killed the design on this mini. It might look okay, but I really should have stopped at the blue fabric. It just really looks so much more colorful and vibrant.

"Das Auge der Weißheit" pillow and mug rug

Thank you for joining me today and reading about how I designed and created the pillow for my pcswapas partner, Michelle, called "Das Auge der Weißheit" or "the Eye of Wisdom" as you would translate it into English. I think you might even say the all-knowing eye, but I couldn't find information on this exact term. I don't normally pick a German title for my creations, but it just seamed better! Michelle was totally happy with her pillow. You can see more pictures on my Flickr Feed or on Instagram @easypatchwork.

pillow swap four seasons - 2016

Hi Everyone! Thanks for dropping by! If you don't already know, I am co-founder and co-swap-mama to Pillow Swap Four Seasons. (Sandra, the hohenbrunnerquilter, the other half, keeps me in line and on top of things! She is so damned organized!) We had so much fun organizing our seasonal pillow swap, we decided to keep the fun going into 2016!

What kind of group are we and what do we do? 

Well, we are an international group of quilters/patchworkers/sewers who love to celebrate the seasons by designing pillows for others within our group. It takes place four times a year. When you sign up, you are required to design a mosaic of inspiration as well as stating your interests on the registration form. This will help your new partner to "get to know you." After the registration period is over, you will receive a new, secret partner and aren't allowed to tell anyone who it is. Then we post pictures of our fabric and/or design choices. It gets really exciting when we start this phase; sometimes you can guess who your partner is and sometimes not. It really is loads of fun. We are open to new participants - novice to expert. You will be grouped together with your years of experience in the hobby/field.

Let me share with you some of the awesome pillows I have received this year (2015).

I received this beautiful pillow and big package from Tammy just this last week! Isn't it beautiful? I totally love cardinals, red and black. She incorporated all of that into the pillow. And she made me the cutest sewing kit, filled to the brim with sewing notions!

Received from Tammy - Winter PS4S

Yes, I have been wanting to make one of these beauties, but I was more secretly wishing for one! Tammy read my mind too! She also send additional fabrics, her favorite tea, a card game from the Penn. Dutch and so many little goodies like the key chain and Clover clips hidden in the sewing kit.

I totally loved the package I received from Carolin for our autumn swap too. I love a bit of whimsy in my pillows and Carolin made this cute Halloween pillow with a spider and a web. Look carefully, because Ms. Spider is made from a large black button. She also made that cute pumpkin pin cushion and mug rugs with foxes!! Soo cute! And of course, a Charlie Brown coffee mug!

Received from Carolin @faedchenspiel - Autumn PS4S

Right before summer I received this adorable pillow from Karin with the sun just peeking over the horizon! Just adorable and whimsical as well! She also sent along a few extra gifts of the cute bunny and heart. I have no idea how anyone can make such beauties?! And the postcard, just perfect!

Received from Karin @karinpaosater - Summer PS4S

My very first secret swap partner was Karri. She made me this wonky star pillow using fresh, jelly bean fabric colors! Just beautiful! She also sent a lot of little extras (which are not pictured here.)

Received from Karri @karriofberries - Spring PS4S

I have to say, all of my partners (the women sewing for me) were so incredibly awesome! They are so unbelievably talented, creative, and wonderful gift givers, too. Thank you ladies, Tammy, Karin, Carolin and Karri! You are fabulous!

Are you interested in becoming a part of a real group?  If you are, maybe you would like to join us? Everyone is welcome as long as you really want to participate and give it your all! : )
Click on the page above for more information.

Click here if you would like to register. Please have a mosaic of interests ready before you sign up.

Sign-ups close on Friday, Dec. 11, 2015. Partners will be assigned on Monday, Dec. 14, 2015. We look forward to seeing you there.

Have a wonderful day!