baby gift – star pillow tutorial

It seems at a certain age all your girlfriends start getting pregnant. Which in turn gives me an opportunity to think up handmade gifts for them and their babies! Cue this little star pillow I made for a friend’s baby boy:

Inspired by star pillows on Etsy I decided to make my own. It’s a nice little evening project.

Draw a star form on paper in the size you want your pillow to be, add seam allowances and cut your template. Cut two pieces from contrasting fabric. I chose some green fabric I had in my stash which also makes it gender neutral.

I also added a stitched face to make it look friendlier. The lines are drawn on with a pencil and then stitched with embroidery floss.

Sew with right sides together, leaving an opening in one of the star legs. Ahem, yes my stars were cut pretty roughly and don’t fit together perfectly. Just cut away any excess fabric once you’re done sewing. I chose to handsew because a. I love me a little handsewing on the couch and b. I couldn’t be bothered to get the sewing machine up for just a few seams.
Clip the corners and curves and turn the pillow inside out. Stuff with polyfill and handsew the opening shut. Et voilà! A sweet, handmade baby gift made in one evening.

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two new pillows

I can’t seem to move on from the sunny circles…I guess frayed-edged circles and me aren’t done yet! This time on my favourite purple Ikea fabric (don’t go looking for it in the fabric section…it’s a bedsheet that I cut apart).

And this one isn’t technically new, since I made it for a friend and she received it some time ago but I haven’t shown it on here yet. The fabric is a bright red jersey, so no finishing edges, yay!
It’s pretty quick and easy to whip up, I might do a tutorial if anyone’s interested?

circus elephant pillow

After all those photo posts at last a little sewing again! This little pillow was inspired by Sara Gruen’s great book ‘Water for Elephants’. The idea just popped into my head one day and I already had the little elephant stamp which I had carved out of lino. The scraps are mostly a selection of Anna Maria Horner’s Good Folks line (my love for that collection will never die!) and are handstitched on a piece of white fabric with red embroidery floss.
The gold fabric is a satin-woven Ikea cotton, which I love to use for almost anything, because it’s so silky and I’m in love with that precise colour so much 🙂

The combination of gold and bright reds and purples feels totally ‘circussy’ to me!

It’s up now in the shop and I will probably make another one or two when I find the time. If they don’t sell I’ll just keep them all for myself 🙂
I’m also working on another Sunny Circles Pillow, which will also go to the shop in a couple of days (I know that one is a favourite among my friends so I thought I’d give heads up here…talk about lame excuses for shameless self-promoting!)
Wishing you all a day full of colour and sunshine 🙂