Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Quick and Easy


I was surfing around last night looking for free motion quilting ideas when I saw this cute i-phone pillow at Dog Named Banjo. Robyn filled hers with random obscure grains from the pantry, but I thought about filling mine with crushed walnut shells. I've seen several pincushion tutorials that suggest using the lizard litter from pet stores. I remembered seeing a nifty pin cushion somewhere that was made of two squares but somehow turned into a cute little pyramid. So off I went to find a tutorial remembering only that I had seen it turned into a chicken on somebody's blog. I think the idea behind the i-phone pillow is the same concept, so I was motivated to find directions. Apparently The Domestic Goddess wrote instructions here. So in the 10 minutes of sewing time I had after my Girl Scout leader meeting tonight, I whipped up a little trial version. Now I've got 5 quarts of crushed walnut shells,and it looks like I'll be making pin cushions for a while. Does anybody have a cute pattern I should try?
Last night was Cub Scouts, tonight was Girl Scouts, tomorrow is a girls night out for work, so my machine time is looking limited for a while. I did go into the quilting room for a few minutes though to sew another row on the I Spy quilt. It is awfully handy to have it sitting there and waiting patiently.
I touched base with the Girl Scout leader who was my point of contact on the quilting project and apparently the shelter for women and children that her troop was helping to refurbish has yet to reopen. She is holding onto the quilts for me, but if that doesn't work out I'll have to find a new shelter in need of quilts.

3 comments:

Amanda said...

I've just got back from a few days away, and I'm green with envy reading all your posts about the fun you're having with your new toy. The quilting looks great, so you're obviously getting the hang of it pretty quickly.

Linda said...

Ahh, Sydney is so cute without her front teeth...another quilter in the making! Your quilting is looking great.

I made a big pincushion using the walnut shells off of the Moda website. I love the pincushion but it is really heavy. It's big enough to use as a door stop if you wanted to...I don't know how true it is but I'm trying to do some research. I heard that the walnut shells stuff will scratch your pins and make them rust. Hmm, I don't like that cuz I buy the expensive pins...Have you heard anything about this?
Anyway, I have also just made a cute strawberry pinchushion off of Embroideroo's blog. I got to her site from http://freebiesforcrafters.blogspot.com/. Go check her out and the Freebie site, it has several pincushions. If you want, I can send you a list of pincushion sites I've accumulated...let me know. Hugs, Linda

Karen said...

Once I started making pincushions and using the crushed walnut shells, I have purchased three of those size bags. The pincushions make good gifts and I have a collection started for myself.