TGIFF: Keepsake Quilted Tie Pillows

This week I finished up another commission project for a friend.

I have decided that 2016 (and 2017, for that matter) will be the year of saving. Saving for a longarm/midarm. I'm a woman on a mission.

So - I've been working hard at making money (I wrote up my 'techniques' on how I do that as a stay at home mom in this previous post) - offering my services to friends and relatives, plugging away at my Etsy shop, and squirreling away gift cards from doing online surveys (don't laugh - I make good coin at it...).

One of the projects I've been really lucky, and honored, to create was a commissioned set of pieced and quilted tie pillows for one of my friends from her dad's old ties. A way she and her siblings could remember him by.

It was fun to work with a different textile; and even more fun when she told me not to wash out the coffee stains and food remnants - all the more to remember her dad by.

Very cool.

Also very unnerving cutting into someone's memories. Oy.

But they turned out well; this set are 10x10; earlier in the summer I made another 4, almost double the size, and they turned out well too.

They are backed with a silk, chosen by the customer.

The recipient wanted me to cut the ties open, remove the interfacing, and cut the ties into smaller strips - unlike other tie pillow tutorials out there.

I used a QAYG (quilt as you go) method to assemble the fronts, stitching the cut tie strips onto a batting and Osnaburg foundation.




Sew at Home Mummy Tip:

Ties are cut on the bias - therefore very stretchy, and wriggly!
When using the QAYG technique use plenty of pins or a quick spray of quilt basting spray to keep the pieces from shifting as you piece.



I placed YYK zippers in a side seam on each of the pillows.

Sew at Home Mummy Tip:

For puffier pillows, make smaller covers.

Make your cover 1/2" - 1" smaller square than your form/insert. 

These covers are 9" square for a 10" form.


Pillows are off to be with their new owner(s) now! Today I'm linking up with Thank Goodness it's Finished Friday!

This week TGIFF is being hosted by M-R of Quilt Matters - head on over there and visit her linky-party, and check out what she and others have been up to!


**And, as a side note - check out my post {HERE} for a GIVEAWAY! for Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day!!**