Sewing Sunsets

Although I love to sew all through the year, I tend to do much more sewing during the holiday season.  I prefer to make my gifts rather than spend lots of time and money at the local mall.  I have much more fun in my sewing room.

Sew far, we’ve talked about sewing flannel blankets for children or adults. (www.sewseamless.com/Page46.html , www.sewseamless.com/Page47.html , www.sewseamless.com/Page48.html , www.sewseamless.com/Page49.html , www.sewseamless.com/Page50.html and www.sewseamless.com/Page51.html

Fleece blankets are even easier to make and can be a no sew project by simply trimming the edges with pinking shears.

What goes with blankets?  Pillows, of course!

Pillows are also a lot of fun to sew.  They can be any shape or size that you desire and even though there are a lot of commercial sewing patterns on the market, you can make your own pillow pattern quite easily.

For square pillows, decide how large you would like your pillow to be and using a ruler and water soluble marker, draw lines on your fashion fabric. Then add your seam allowance (I recommend 1/2 inch) and trace that.  Cut out your pillow pieces and press them well.  At this point, you will have to decide if you want to embellish your pillows in any way.  Perhaps you might like to do some machine embroidery on one side of the pillow, or perhaps you would like to monogram the pillow.  This is all done on the fabric before the pillow is sewn together.  Place the pillow pieces right sides together and sew, making sure to leave a space for turning right side out.

After the pillow has been sewn, press well and clip the corners diagonally so that you will get a nice sharp corner.  Then turn the pillow right side out and press.  Fill the pillow with fiberfill and hand sew the opening closed.

Round pillows are also fun to make and quite easy.  I use a round coffee can or something like that, and trace around the can, then I add the seam allowance of about 1/2 inch.  The round pillows are sewn in the same way as the square pillows, but there is one difference after the pillows have been sewn.  Because the seams on round pillows are curved seams, they need to be notched and then clipped to the stitching.  I like to trim the seams with pinking shears, which is an easy way to create the notches, and then I clip the seams to the stitching line.

Pillows can be sewn out of any type of fabric, although I prefer to sew pillows with 100% cotton fabric.  However, you could choose to use fleece, velvet, satin, cotten sateen or some other type of fabric. 

Pillows are easy gifts to sew and if you give a pillow and blanket set to the same person, just think how much fun you will have when sewing!  And I’m sure that the recipient of the gift will appreciate your efforts as well. If you give a blanket and a pillow, or pillows, as a set, perhaps you could sew the pillow with a solid fabric that matches one of the colors in the fabric print of the blanket.  If you sew a solid pillow, you could embellish it with some machine embroidery; you could monogram or embroider the person’s name on the pillow.  There are tons of ideas to personalize these gifts.  Sewing pillows might be a great way to reduce your fabric stash or use up some fabric scraps.  This is a great excuse to sew and also a great excuse to buy some more fabric after the holidays are over–when the fabric stores are having great sales, of course.

Tutorial (including pictures) for sewing a square pillow: www.sewseamless.com/Page24.html

Tutorial (including pictures) for sewing a round pillow: www.sewseamless.com/Page22.html  and www.sewseamless.com/Page23.html

Happy Sewing!

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