A Feather Sketch Pillow : :

This weekend I finished up my first Wild & Free quilt top and it's a big one, measuring a 70" square!



This quilt top now makes four finishes for my Quilt Market booth. I know that's not much, but I'm feeling pretty good considering I'm working from just the strike offs right now, which amounts to maybe a 1/2 yard of each print, minus my stars print Midnight Roof that's still being tweaked. Working with my own fabrics is unlike anything I've experienced since I began this sewing journey. There's so much excitement and lots of nerves that come along with this chance to truly create things from the heart. But I'm trying my best to just go for it, just as I would when working with any other designer's collection. More than anything I am having so much fun, as I see the projects I've been dreaming of take form and as I check them off my to-make list!



In the time between finished fabric designs and actual printed fabrics, I've shared here a few sketch stitch pieces, one of a feather and the other a set of arrows inspired by my Fletching Chant print. Now those thread drawings have been framed with fabric, spiffed up with more embroidery, and made into a comfy stack of pillows. They're my first Wild & Free fabric finishes and the first things I want to share here!



First up, my Feather Sketch Pillow!



This sketch began with a rectangle piece of Art Gallery Fabrics Pure Element in Sweet Mint quilted to a scrap piece of Therm O Web StitchnSew fleece. Next I pulled an Aurifil thread color story that matches my collection, and I began to freely sketch stitch a simple feather.



Using a narrow strip from both my Woven Path and Sun Tracks prints I finished one side of my feather sketch with a simple quilted striping. The other side I left soft and sweet piecing together a few HSTs leftover from my quilt top making, adding more texture with my favorite triangle satin stitch!





I used this stitch again around the inner edge of my pillow binding and I love the result! It's a little time consuming, but that extra texture and color is so pretty, I might have to finish a quilt this way sometime soon!



I have lots of new finishes to share in the days ahead including an Emmy Grace quilt that still needs a name, my Autumn Sun quilt, and I plan to share all the Wild & Free projects I'm working on as I prepare for Quilt Market. I really hope you'll enjoy following along with me!

♥ Maureen