In addition to showing you my second and third PIF Exchange giveaway items, I’ll tell you about two other blogs I love that you probably already know about but *just in case* you don’t.
First of all, Green Kitchen. Michelle is a huge inspiration- in addition to obviously being an awesome mother to ridiculously cute children (something that impresses me more and more the longer I am a mom), she is a multi-talented artist and artisan. Her work is just beautiful, and she is so generous about sharing it on her blog. In a very well-thought-out plan to garner more readers (and she really should have millions), she’s promising even more tutorials in addition to her already chock-full content. I used her most recent, very clever one, to make a neat wrist pincushion out of some vintage ribbon I got at the Alameda Flea Market last year
It looks to me rather like a tiny fairy princess pillow. It was such fun to make, and as I find blanket stitching one of the most calming and satisfying hand-sewing tasks, it was just what the doctor ordered for a quiet crafting evening. Head over to the tutorial if you want to make one yourself!
It was from reading Michelle’s blog that I found out Heather Ross had started a blog. And like her totally addictive fabric, her online journal Weekend is beyond charming. From there, I found out that Starlit Nest was carrying every colorway of Heather’s new Mendocino fabric line. Since I’m rather psycho about Heather’s fabric, I decided I just had to have the package of 10″ squares in every single colorway and pattern. Since I totally stink at putting together fabrics, even ones in a line designed to go together that are already cut to size, to make anything patchworked, they have been arranged and rearranged on my craft room floor and then put back in their envelope. I thought making something out of just two of them might get me going on a bigger project, so voila the Mendocino Lavender Pillow
I quilted the front to some batting by stitching around one motif in each row
And backed it with a piece of unquilted fabric
Then I stuffed it lightly with polyfill and added several generous handfuls of Sonoma County lavender (grown and dried by my friend’s father), and blind stitched it shut.
Please pop over and comment on my last post if you’d like to join in on the PIF exchange and get your hands on this pillow! It’s gone!