Hello and Happy Monday! Since I so enjoyed writing my last post about the nine patch sister quilts that Sharon Holland and I made, along with sharing the free Charming Nine pdf pattern so you can make your own, I decided I'd pop back in today with a long overdue Homebody favorites post!
Homebody is my latest and thirteenth collection to date with fabric manufacturing company, Art Gallery Fabrics. This sixteen piece collection at its core, celebrates the unspoken magic of being home! The concept and artwork for Homebody was created and submitted to AGF long before we were all "stuck" in our homes these past 365 days, so the somewhat ironic timing will always be something I particularly treasure and laugh about when it comes to this collection. For me, home means creating a cozy space with a calm, peaceful environment that nourishes and comforts. These designs full of cheerful florals, cozy feathers, boho blenders and soft textures colored in a pretty palette reveals exactly the style of our own home and the layers of prints, patterns and things we've collected over the years that have made our house a home. Homebody has been amazing to sew with these past several weeks, from small accessory projects to large quilts. You can find loads of inspiration in the the LookBook, a 68-page book filled with beautiful pictures and amazing projects, and today I thought I'd share some of my favorites!
I'm going to start with what I made as soon as my Homebody rolls arrived, this set of quilted cosmetic bags for my daughter and I to showcase some of the main florals in this new collection! Everything I've learned about making bags I've learned from Svetlana of sotakhandmade, so if you're looking to make something similar I suggest her Essential Pouch pattern. To make these extra lux I used two layers of Hobbs Tuscany silk batting, just scraps I had leftover from some previously made quilted pillows, and the two layers quilted with a combination of the straight stitch + the wavy stitch created such amazing quilty texture on these!
One of my favorite things when it comes to bag-making is shopping for unique tassel pulls and fun keychains to add. I found these amazing macrame keychains on amazon recently and they look so perfect with the boho style of Homebody!
Next up are some Homebody pillows! I made quite a lot and I have some that I haven't even photographed to share yet. I included the one in Fridays post that started my new nine patch obsession, but here's a second 18" pillow that's very similar, using the same nine patch pattern just without the binding. Again I used two layers of Hobbs Tuscany Silk batting with dense straight line quilting in a light tan Aurifil thread for yummy, cozy quilty texture.
These pair of whole cloth quilted pillows I made for my LookBook to showcase the Homebody main florals -- Togetherness at Home (left) and Togetherness at Heart (right). A great tutorial for making your own whole cloth pillow covers can be found, again, at sotakhandmade. To quilt this pair I used a wavy stitch that comes built-in on my Janome that's become my first choice for quilting when I want something other than the straight stitch. I love it!
Patchwork pillows are always fun to make! This next one is made using 2.5" Homebody squares that I cut from scraps leftover from other projects. This is the first pillow I made to fill with a Hobbs Pillow Pal poly/down pillow insert. Hobbs Bonded Fibers has generously sponsored me with quilt batting over the past few years and recently sent me several of their pillow insert sizes to try out and folks, I promise you -- these are the absolute best I've tried! They have nearly twice the loft of the pillow inserts I previously purchased from Amazon and Joann over the years, which means they make for a very full pillow which in my opinion always looks and feels the best!
For the fun of it, since I'm still making things at home rather than my studio, I took my box of Homebody finished pillows that are eventually headed to the shop side of my studio and added them to our bed to snap some photos to share asking the question, how many pillows are too many? I'd love to know your thoughts on that!
I've made four quilts/tops now that include Homebody, two are the Charming Nines that I shared on Friday so I'll start with my forever favorite go-to quilt to make, a Quick Quilt As You Go Herringbone QAYG quilt! I'm going to be completely honest and share that the near perfect way my fabrics lined up was a complete accident with this one. One of my favorite things about this pattern is that because of the way it's made, the fabric panels don't typically match up and istead the fabrics are staggered, creating a super scrappy zig zag effect that is all about having fun and not having to worry about perfectly matched points. Imagine my surprise when this was finished, trimmed and laid out that my panels nearly all lined up, minus the one part, well, I decided that was totally okay with me. What makes this quilt extra special is that for the LookBook my daughter Haila modeled the finished quilt!
Ever since Art Gallery Fabrics launched The Denim Studio line of smooth solid and printed denims I've wanted to make a classic star block quilt. I took this pic of my stashed denims in 2017 and as it would turn out, I was just waiting for Homebody to finally make my denim quilt!
Using just two Homebody prints -- my Togetherness at Home floral as the star centers and Domestic Charm Birch as the background fabric, I pulled out my denims and started with just one block!
The Nectarine Sunrise Smooth Solid Denim is the only non blue denim I added because it's peachy pink color pairs perfectly with my floral. I used the Nectarine Sunrise denim to create an X within the repetitive star block pattern and I think it turned out so good. Using such a limited palette is not my typical choice when it comes to making quilts, but this truly turned out exactly how I had hoped it would all those years ago. when my denim star quilt was just a dream.
The economy block centers of each star block yielded corner scraps that I immediately sewed into HSTs, so right after I had finished the quilt I had enough to make this matching pillow!
I think this pillow is a great place to stop today with my Homebody favorites! Of course I have tons more, but I think I'll save those for another day, soon. I hope these projects inspire you and that you love Homebody as much as I do!
