Let's sew some pillows!

Laughter is vital to life.  Without it, all you're doing is waiting to die.  Laugh every single day and you may not live longer, but the life you do live will be way more worth it.

This is why I'm so thankful for this blog and for the readers and friends that I've found through it.  We found each other and when I get down in the dumps, I write and you read and then miracles happen because you make me laugh and then I forget that I'm down in the dumps and all becomes right with the world.

So I'd like to return the favor and perhaps bring you a little laugh today, courtesy of my friend Ashley.  She left the most brilliant comment on my last post, regarding my sofa pillows.  It was a seemingly innocuous question, a perfectly legitimate query.  But when I tell you I actually laughed out loud - one of those BAH!! kind of outburst laughs, followed by a genuine smile and a chuckle of glee, well....um.....I did one of those BAH!! laughs and then genuinely smiled and chuckled with glee.  ANYWAY!

I want to tell you a story and hopefully you'll laugh.

On the last post, I asked you, my fine readers, where I could get some good pillows for cheap and Ashley was like, Um hello?  Don't you have a sewing machine?  Sew up your own pillows girl!  And then she made my day.  May I show you?

Way back in the day, this was our pillow setup in the old house.

It was Drew's sofa and Drew's pillows, so I'm not going to hate.

At least it's not black leather.

Side note:  Before I had gone to his house, I had a strict no-black-leather-sofa

rule and I would have broken up with him on the spot had he owned a black leather sofa.

Same goes for neon beer signs.

I breathed a complete sigh of relief when I walked into his loft and saw this.

But this isn't about my dating design rules - focus Desiree!  This is about my pillow-sewing prowess.  Fast forward to several years later; we're married, we have a kid, we're on our second house and the tan sofa and brown pillows have moved to the basement playroom.  Brown pillows just won't do in a happy and colorful playroom so I set out to fix that with my trusty sewing machine and a trip to JoAnn's.  I hemmed my jeans, I can sew two squares of fabric together, right?

No.  No, I cannot. 

My pillows are 16x16.  I got my fabric, lined it up and cut two 16x16 squares.  (The sewing people just smiled and shook their heads.)

You need a seam allowance, derr.  That's the part that the sewing machine foot grabs so the fabric will stay straight and it's usually an inch on all sides.  I sewed one side, realized my mistake and was like, no big, I'll just add a strip of fabric to fudge the width I need.

Don't do that, because you end up with a Frankenpillow.

Cute little ikat-ish, chevron-y type print.

The back of my pillow.  Did I line up my pattern? Nope.

Did I do that on purpose.  Nope.

Seam allowance, y'all.  You need it.

The mismatch-y pattern just hurts my feelings but I pressed on.

Fudging the seam allowance on the other side.

Some Franken-stitches on one corner because I still didn't get my measurements right.

Seam allowance!

You have to say in your 'Toe pick!' voice.

Seam allowance *and* closing it up.  Oh so pretty!

You'd think that sewing two squares together wouldn't be that hard, but this is me we're talking about.  I'm the one who put nineteen holes in the wall to hang a 1x2 piece of wood on the wall.  However, I was not to be deterred.  I had other pillows!  I'll just try again!

Same print, contrasting color.

PS, I have no idea why I was drawn to these prints because I hate them now.

'Fun' does not equal 'busy' and these are too busy for me.

I gave myself a proper seam allowance and I was even able to almost line up my pattern!

Except.....

Ummm.....

(The sewing people are wiping the tears from their eyes right now.)

See, on the edge of every fabric there's something called the selvedge.  It tells you what colors are in the fabric, the name of it, the manufacturer and whatever else you need to know about the fabric.  You should not include the selvedge when measuring your seam allowance, but I was so excited that I had solved the seam allowance mystery that I didn't even think about the selvedge snafu.  So ended pillow number two.

I was so annoyed by then, I didn't even bother trying to leave a small opening to stuff the pillow through.  I literally stuffed the pillow and sewed it closed with the pillow inside.

But I'm no quitter - I got started on pillow number three with renewed strength.  My next fabrics didn't even have a selvedge so there was nothing to trip me up!  It wasn't wide enough, but I knew how to measure for a seam allowance so I wasn't scared.  I envisioned a cool color block design and got to piecing it together.  

These pictures are harder to see because the center fabric is pink and the outer

fabric is red, but you get the idea.  I can't sew.

However, I did get a little wiser and use a long strip of fabric so I'd only have three seams

to sew instead of four.  Somehow I thought that would make my lfie easier.

As you will see, it did not.

I sorta got the colorblocking right on one side.

Then it kind of fell apart on the other side.

I kept getting the measurements wrong 

and I just kept adding strips of fabric until I got it right.

I'm using the term 'right' very loosely here.

Using the flash so you can really appreciate what's going on here.

We're not even going to talk about the pillow with piping because this is as far as I got.  

I told myself I could figure out piping.  I can put it back together, I told myself.

No.  No I can't.

Now, these were my very first attempts at sewing pillows.  I want to believe that I've learned something and that if I were to continue, I might eventually get mildly proficient at sewing pillows.  Then again, I could just buy some pillow covers from Etsy and leave the sewing to the people who really know how to do and save myself the headache.

But where's the laughter in that?