Wednesday, January 13, 2010

The EVER changing pillows

I was going to wait until both pillows were complete, but I can't wait to show you this.  I was totally inspired by this pillow from Ballards:


I "KNEW" I could duplicate my own version.  Although I love pink, I didn't really want it in my living room.  I decided to just use scraps I already had.  This time I tried to take pictures as I went.

First, I cut the old cover off.  Remember these beauties?



At first, I was going to do coffee dyed canvas like materials as the base for the pillow.  However, after dying the material in the coffee water and then washing them, I was left with a frayed mess.  Remember, i am new to the "Crafty" world.  So, I didn't have enough white fabric to cover 2 pillows.  I decided to use the white fabric for the stem.



I drew out the stem and leaves, and then cut it out as one solid piece.
Can I interject...Does anyone else's "Work" area ever look like this or is it just mine?




Then I hot glued the stem/leaves thingy on the pillow.  The peacock blue cover that is already on the pillow is what was under the felt pillow.  It used to be cuter with a red tufted button in the middle.  I put that fabric on a long time ago, but the boys popped off the cute button (hence the need for the felt cover at Christmas).

Then I started on the flower, itself.  I traced different sized circles out of all my blueish scrap fabric.  This one was a scrap from what was covering entire pillow.  Most scraps that I used were free sample pieces taken from actual fabric bolts. Some of those samples were fairly big.



I then layered them like this, sewed them together, and added a button.



Then I took the needle through entire pillow to the back of it and gently pulled it tight until it looked "tufted" (not sure if I'm using this term correctly or not).  Next time I will use dental floss, because I was on the brink of breaking that delicate sewing thread too many times.  I'm not sure how long this one will hold and may have to redo with the floss sooner than later.  It worked for now, and the result was awesome.


At this point, I just needed to finish the edges of the stem and leaves.  I bought some brown decorative trim at HL for $1.00 and just hot glued it a couple of times around stem and leaves.  I am not great with the glue gun yet and had a lot of strings and goops.  I found that if I put a clean cloth over bad areas and pressed with an iron, I could smooth out most of the mistakes.





Here is a close up of the flower:


and here is the result


Once I get the other pillow done, I'll show you how they look on my couch.  What do you think?

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7 comments:

Room to Inspire said...

Great inspiration pillow and great project! I love you newly flowered pillow and I am sure they are going to look great on your couch!

Chelsea

Kathryn said...

It turned out very cute and I like it better than the original that you based the pillow off of.

I love also love that I am not the only one that uses whatever is handy (like the cup in one picture) to draw circles for projects.

Micah said...

Okay,,,,This is awesome Glory! I cannot believe you made this. This is so Anthropology! I am going to feature this on my blog if you do not mind:)

nicole said...

I think it looks great. And if I had a crafting area, it would definitely look worse than that. When I was in my bow-making phase I had ribbon from one end of the table to the other with scraps on the floor and glue spots all over the place. I was a mess. And the bows were only okay. ;)

Sonia said...

Great job!The pillow looks as if it belongs from a glossy magazine. I love how you laced the stem with a trim; and yes, my craft area looks way worse: you wouldn't ever visit my blog if I showed you how it looks!!

Jamie said...

Your pillows are adorable!

rebecca @ older and wisor said...

Super cute. And you should never trust a crafter with a neat workspace ;)