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Wednesday, April 27, 2011

I'm feathering my nest!

We have a sofa and two chairs in our family room that are slipcovered.  Okay, so white might not have been the best choice for people who work in the print industry, but I love, love, LOVE my white slipcovered furniture!  We looked a long time to find these pieces as when we were buying them most of the furniture stores were loaded with heavy, dark Tuscany style furniture which is beautiful – in someone else’s house.  Me? I’m a blue and white and yellow person.  I like it light and airy!

However, the last time I pulled the slipcovers off to launder them, I had a major problem!  One of the cushion’s inner casing had split.  When I unzipped the slipcover, there were down feathers EVERYWHERE!  This is NOT a good thing. 

It looked sort of like this, only this is after stuffing several handfuls of feathers back into the casing!

I stuffed as many feathers as I could back inside and slip stitched the split together so the feathers could be vacuumed up.  Then another piece of fabric needed to be appliquéd over the split to contain the feathers.  Definitely not the way I had things planned for the day!

Do you ever have days like that?  Days where you have your ducks in a row, but one of them just won’t stay in the row?  Do you handle it well?  Sometimes I do and sometimes I don’t.  Today it’s funny, but at the time?  Not so much!

I really DO like feathers -- especially the quilted type and I use them as often as possible in my quilts and quilted things.

This pillow is one of the first things I hand quilted for use in our home.  It’s sort of plain, but using the blue quilting thread helped me to work on even stitches.

Later when asked to teach hand quilting classes, I designed this fancier feathered heart.  It has not only feathers, but stipple quilting and cross hatch quilting as many quilters use these three types of quilting in their quilts.  I encourage new hand quilters to use matching thread just so they can be proud of their first project and not be hung up on the unevenness of their stitching.  With practice the even stitches will come.

Until next time.

Lois

5 comments:

Lorinda said...

You bring back so many memories! Which of the hearts was one of those very first CCQG projects?
My current project is actually my very first quilt - a baby quilt for Hank that never progressed past the basting stage. It is 12 animal blocks all made with very untraditional fabrics. Seems fitting that baby Lie get his/her Dad's quilt.

Lois Arnold said...

Lorinda, the simpler feathered heart with the cross hatch in the center probably was the project I taught at that early CCQG meeting. We've come a LONG way since then! I'm giggling, though, as Jeff's son got the quilt I had started for him and never finished. It's not a surprise that your quilt uses nontraditional fabrics. Can't wait to see a picture of it.

julieQ said...

HI Lois!! Yes, I have had those kind of days...and a full vacuum cleaner later...LOL!! Your feathers are beautiful, and I am so glad to have gotten to discover your blog!!

Jeanne said...

I'm very familiar with those kind of days. LOL I hope you have the feathers all back where they belong. Your pillows are lovely.

Lois Arnold said...

Jeanne, I either got all the feathers back in the cushion or sucked up into the vacuum before all the company Easter weekend. Thank you for the comment and the compliment on the feather pillows. I really do like feathers!