Quilted Sea Turtle Pillow — July 2017

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This is the Scrappy Sea Turtle Pillow I designed and made as a gift for a very dear friend. She listens without being judgmental, she encourages without being critical, but she also tells it like it is. She is the best kind of friend and she’s made a wonderful difference in my life so I wanted her to have something special to know that she’s important and cared for.  She adores Sea Turtles–and purple & blue are her favorite colors.

At first I was going to make this as a wall hanging. Then I decided to make it into a pillow instead so my friend can display it easily wherever she wants and it’s hug-able. Making the quilted turtle as a pillow sham (with a custom shredded gel-foam pillow insert) also keeps the quilted turtle sham easy to wash and dry.

This is my own original design, entirely from scratch. Where did I get the turtle image? I looked at many sea turtle images and sketched my own. Then I challenged myself to use only fabrics, threads and items from my own personal stash–no buying anything new.

First the turtle was outlined with a hand sewn big stitch using rayon perle from my personal stash.

I used raw edge fusible applique (using Sew Lazy Fusi-Bond http://www.sewthankful.com/Sew_Lazy_Fusi_Bond_Lite_Sew_Lazy_SLG101.html) to place the pieces of the turtle body & shell.

 

Each piece is freemotion quilted using Superior Microquilter thread (http://www.sewthankful.com/superior-sewing-threads-microquilter.html).

Then I added wavy quilting lines (to give the feel of water) using Superior Rainbows Thread (I used #831 Mediterranean – http://www.sewthankful.com/Superior-Thread-Rainbows.html ).

 

The scrappy binding was made from random small scraps of fabric used to make the turtle.

The finished dimensions of the pillow are approximately 27 inches x 20 inches.

I love how this sea turtle turned out. Even better, my friend was thrilled and loves it too.

Yes, a pattern is being developed…stay tuned.