Thursday, August 18, 2011

A Goodbye Gift

I have been saving the selvedges (sp?) from my fabrics for maybe two years now. I don't really know why - I guess I started to see projects that use them now and then and I figured, "I may want these someday." I have come very close, on multiple occasions, to throwing them away - it just has added more clutter to my overflowing fabric stash. But there are some awesome projects that use them - there's even a whole flickr group dedicated to it and someone even made a whole dress out of them! Amy, from Made During Quiet Time, recently joined our Boston Modern Quilt Guild and she has an awesome tutorial on how to make a very cute armrest pincushion. I thought it would be a perfect going away gift for Monet:

Working with the selvedges was fun - I am now glad that I saved them. When choosing which ones to use - I simply looked for ones with lots of lettering or circle/colored dots.

I would recommend, when working with selvedges- when sewing them onto the background square - use a square a little larger than the measurement of what you want to end up with. I found that all of my sewing made the piece a bit wonky and I had to cut it to size at the end and some of the edges didn't end up having the "support" of the background square. The only alteration I did to Amy's tutorial was adding a flannel bag of rice into the pincushion in order to make it have more weight.

I gave this small gift to Monet at the end of our afternoon at the World Quilt Show. I will post about the show tomorrow. Right now I am feeling a little overstimulated by being at the show most of the day (SO many beautiful quilts and SO many vendors!) but I also feel a little overwhelmed. Monet was the founder and leader of our guild and has worked tirelessly to create a very meaningful organization and she also has been a wonderful, true friend. I am going to miss her terribly as she heads off to law school. Her departure not only means that I won't get to see her much but it also signals the transition for me to go from being vice president to president. I love the guild and I am excited to continue working as an officer - but of course it is a little intimidating! I have to say that I am more than grateful to Monet for providing a wonderful foundation to a group that I hope will thrive for many more years.

3 comments:

Amy Friend said...

Oh, it is beautiful! What a nice gift. I hope Monet is happy in her new home.

Splendorfalls said...

I'm saving mine too, I like this project! Cute!

Rachel said...

:( it's beautiful. sad for monet's leaving. (MONEEEET! get off the plane and stay here!!!)
her shoes aren't fill-able, but you're going to be a great pres, too.