These last few weeks of scorching daytime temps brought a renewed urge to spend time sitting inside at my sewing machine. After the Abruzzo quilt, I was in the mood to do some smaller scale machine quilting projects. I pulled a pile of favorite fabrics from my stash and decided I wanted to make some new pillows. My first few patchwork designs seemed great in my brain, but were disappointing once I actually sewed them. Finally I got the idea to use various sized strips of fabric to create a zanzy, random-striped 21" square patchwork piece. But "random" doesn't come easily to me, so the first set of fabric strips took a long time to size and arrange.
Here's a closeup of the stitching. As on my quilted tote bags of yore (haven't made any lately), I used many colors of cotton thread, usually matching the tone-on-tone fabrics, but sometimes picking out a key color from a print. A mixture of straight stitching on some areas and on others, a wavy stitch that my machine offers gives a nice variation of texture to the quilting. The batting is a thin cotton, backed with plain muslin.
Once I had my method down, it was easy to assemble the second pillow top. I'm really happy with how these turned out and plan to make some more. They're an easy project to start and stop as time permits, especially if you have the luxury of leaving your sewing machine set up in the dining room!
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