Pillow Talk {Swap} 8 Finished!

With just a few days before the mail date, I finished my pillow for the Pillow Talk {Swap}!  I'll be sending it off to my partner today.

I used Summersville by Lucie Summers for Moda.  I thought about adding in some solids, but I really liked how well this line worked altogether, and I ended up using the black prints as kind of an anchor - when I was making the HSTs, I just sewed a black print onto another color.

This is a two-sided quilted pillow.  One side has a little embroidery on it.

The other doesn't.

This pillow also has an invisible zipper.  I've never done an invisible zipper before, and it's not perfect, but it's good enough.  I definitely want to make some of these for my own couch!  I used this tutorial from Sew Katie Did.

I hope my partner likes it!

WiP Wednesday

Wow - it's been a while! Life is catching up with me, I guess. I'm still sewing - just not as much. And I'm finding I just don't have a lot of time to blog. Or at least, if I do have time, I don't really think about it.
First I want to show something that I recently finished. 

Before I moved to Florida last year I knew I wanted to start a modern quilt guild.  Through Flickr and her blog, I discovered that Kelly B. lived here and was also interested in starting a MQG. Around that same time, I found (through the main MQG website) Melissa, another girl in the area that wanted a guild. The three of us emailed, and finally met together after I moved here. Kelly and Melissa both helped me get this guild started in a major way, and in September of last year, the Emerald Coast MQG had it's first meeting!

At that time, Kelly and myself were both Air Force spouses, which means that we aren't here permanently.  Kelly's time in Florida was coming to a close, and she would be moving in May.  Since she was such a big part of this guild, I wanted to do something special for her. So I made up some siggy blocks for people in the guild to sign. Once they were all signed, I pieced them together, along with a border, then gave that to Melanie to handstitch over the names. She gave it back to me. I quilted it, bound it, and sent it off to Kelly (because we didn't finish it in time to give it to her in person before she moved). We made it into a wall hanging, and hopefully it will live on the wall in Kelly's new beautiful sewing room in Tennessee.

We miss Kelly and keep trying to convince her to come down once a month for meetings. 

Now onto the WiPs...

I started my block for the QuiltCon Block Challenge a week or so ago.  It's actually taking me longer than I'd like, but I haven't had a chance to just sit down and finish it, and there's lots of HST's involved.  Here's a sneak peek:

And I've taken my first custom order for a quilt.  She wants a zig zag quilt for her baby.  I've got the blocks assembled, just have to trim (my least favorite part) and put it all together.

And another round of the Pillow Talk {Swap} on Flickr is starting, so I signed up for that.  I'm making time for it because I love that swap so much, and had to sit out the last round.  I'm not missing it again, and my couch is in need of a new pillow!  I'm eagerly waiting to find out who my partner is so I can start working on that, so stay tuned...

I'm linking up to WiP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced.  Head on over there to see what other people are working on!

Pillow Talk {Swap} - Done!

I've been wanting to join in the Pillow Talk {Swap} ever since I first discovered it, which was maybe around Round 3 or so.  This is Round 6, and even though I had so much going on (moving, travelling, etc.), I just couldn't resist joining in.

I really like the partner I was assigned to, but also a little intimidated.  She's great.  Her mosaics were awesome.  And I was scared. 

I wasn't able to start on the pillow right away, because we were still living at my mom's house, in the middle of closing on our house, and there was just too much going on.  But that doesn't mean I wasn't thinking about it.  I'm glad my situation didn't allow me to start right away, though, because I was able to take the time to really figure out what I wanted to do. 

Like so many of us right now, I'm kind of addicted to Pinterest.  And I wasn't even looking for inspiration this one particular day, when it slapped me right in the face!  I found this picture of a painting...

Photo courtesy of jeffdepner.com

My partner likes zig zags, and I thought this was a cool, different take on a zig zag.  Alissa commented on this when I pinned it and called it a "messed up zig zag." 

But could I execute it?  That's always my fear.

I sketched and sketched and sketched until I finally figured it out how I could do it.

Once we moved into our new house, and I got a little bit of time to work, I cranked out the top of the pillow.  It actually came together quicker than I thought it would!

Then it was quilted...

Then we went on vacation, so it had to wait until we got back.  Then I really needed to finish my bee blocks, so those came first when I came back from vacation. 

Last night I was finally able to finish it, so here it is!

The back features a block (which is actually designed by Bek) that my partner happens to like, so it's just a little something extra.  For this blog - again - I had to do some serious sketching.  I actually gave up a few times on this one, but finally figured it out, which is so rewarding!

So that's it!  I'm sending it off today and I hope my partner likes it.