Fill-in Projects

While I was going through my stash looking for fabric for last week's Project Quilting challenge, I came across a few kits for small quilting projects and decided that they would be good fill-in projects for the weeks in between challenges.  

The one I decided to work on first was a snowman pillow that was part of the Button Pillow series by Karen Montgomery of The Quilt Company.  I finished the pillow top and added a zipper to the back instead of making the cross-over back that the instructions call for. I was feeling pretty proud of myself for remembering how to do it.  You know how they say that pride goeth before a fall?  Keep reading....

Instead of storing my seasonal pillows when they are not in use, I've been making pillow covers and reusing the same pillow forms.  The pillows take up a lot less storage space that way. Realizing that the pillow form that would fit the new pillow was already in use, I decided to just make a new one rather than buy one.  

I found the muslin that I had bought some time ago for a long forgotten project, cut out an appropriately sized chunk sewed it together.  The next step was to find something to stuff it with.  I have lots and lots (and lots...) of left-over batting scraps.  I remembered being told that flat batting doesn't make good pillow filling because it isn't fluffy enough.  So I reasoned that if I cut it into small chunks, there would be a lot of air in between the pieces, which would make it 'fluffy'!

Again feeling proud of myself for figuring that out, I got out an old cutting mat and an old rotary cutter with a 'dull' blade.  My cutting table was piled high with other things and I was too lazy to move the clutter.  So I laid the cutting mat on the floor and spread out some of the leftover batting strips.  I then proceeded to kneel on the floor beside the mat and started rolling the rotary cutter back and forth over the batting.  Once the first batch was in small chunks, I put it into the muslin pillow cover and spread out some more.  After repeating this several more time, I was feeling pretty happy with the results.  The pillow cover was getting nice and full and squishy, just like a pillow form should be.  For the next set of batting strips, I put my hand on the mat beside the batting to give me a little more stability.  Can you figure out what happened?  

OUCH!!! The next thing I knew, the middle finger on my left hand had a gash in it that was bleeding profusely!  I'll spare you the gory details (#5 stitches!). In the past, I've always used a ruler with my rotary cutters, and have never done any 'freeform' cutting.  From now on, I'll clean off the clutter and use the table so that I don't have to lean on my hand, or I'll buy one of those cut resistant gloves.

All in all, I was very lucky.  I didn't cut any ligaments or tendons, and the gash is on my left hand. And my husband doesn't mind doing dishes!