I'm not sure how this happened, but I have made the worst choices in fabrics to cover my accent pillows in over the past 10 years. They are interesting shapes, but seriously the most boring, conservative, neutral colors.
I mean they are ACCENT pillows for pity sake, meant to spice things up not blend in and disappear. And I've just lived with it; always thinking, "Well, when I'm really in my own house I'll redo them so I like them in a more permanent color scheme." So, been here 9 months now and still the same blah pillows...until this week! Naturally, I made a trip to the local Goodwill. A couple of reasons I head to the thrift stores for most of my projects lately: a)I feel ethically better reusing/
repurposing existing materials (all kinds of stuff, not just fabrics) rather than increasing the demand for new materials. b)I've found that this town has much better thrift stores than fabric stores.
Anywho, I dug through the Goodwill t-shirt bins until I found some colors that spoke to me. They said, "Ruffle us PLEASE!" While there I also found a big old dress that really wanted some white piping and a new life as my pyramid pillow. That same dress had a lining that was perfect on my star pillow. Drum roll please! Introducing the newly covered pillows!
The pillow made from M's old cargo pants ages ago is still the same, but I have plans to try the old-freezer-paper-stencil technique on it soon. I'm feeling inclined to do an octopus?!?! I'll post on what it turns out to be sometime soon.
Now the patches.
As I was folding laundry, I discovered that both J's &
AJ's pants had holes in the knees. "Yippee!" I thought, "L
et's bust out the iron-on webbing!!" Boy's stuff is decidedly harder to decorate and still meet daddy's macho approval, but here's what we got using recycled denim & corduroy from old pants.
the pirate flags...(I drew the jolly rogers on in ballpoint pen a shade darker than the dark denim. Then I ditched the presser foot and feed dogs on my sewing machine and free stitched around them a couple of times in white. Then I ironed the dark denim on to the pants.)
the space explorer...(this was straight up iron-on; no stitching.)
and my favorite, the rock star!...(I ironed all the pieces together, did the top stitching details and then ironed them on the pants.) J just LOVES these!
Here's what I learned from these projects:
*Rounded shapes iron on better than sharp shapes. (I'm going to try using some waterproof, fabric glue to tack the parts that have come unstuck. I'll let you know if it doesn't work.)
*New colors make me happy!
9 comments:
i love, love that ruffle pillow!
yay for repurposing fabric as accent pillows! do you use a ruffle foot for your ruffles? good job on the worn out knees for boys! thanks for commenting on my blog.
Chris, always proving you are the creative bug in my life!
You are AMAZING. Love the pillows!!!
Love it all!
My patching of pants got sidelined when one of my kids asked me to make him a stuffed pteranodon doll. I ended up making 3, one for each boy, and by then I was so far behind on housework that I gave up on patching pants. You've inspired me to give it another try! I especially love the rock 'n roll pants - too cute!!
Does he find the iron ons too stiff on his knees?
Seriously? You are amazing! And inspiring...I have a hard time looking past what I first see to see what something could actually become. Who would have thunk to dig through t-shirt bins at Goodwill to create those amazing pillows? Seriously...you're awesome!
aleisha, no fancy foot on the ruffles. I just did a single basting stitch & then pulled it to gather up the ruffles on the knit.
LL, the knees don't seem too stiff, but he isn't too fussy about clothes in general.
Oh my amazing! I am constantly astonished by what you do. The pillows are incredible and the pants are absolutely darling!
Ok, one more question. Did you buy some kind of iron on denim, or is there a way to turn regular denim into an iron on? (I'm patching with cut outs from an old pair of pants.)
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