decorate fabric Tutorials

Chrysanthemum Pillow

I saw this pillow the other day in a Joann’s catalog. You can find the instructions at www.Joann.com/homedec. I thought it was gorgeous, I can’t afford to buy one, and I had all this fabric my neighbor gave me from curtains she took down. So what does a crafty girl do? Start cutting fabric.
I decided I wanted mine a little bigger than the one in the instructions, so I cut out two 18″ circles. I know that the circumference of a circle is pi times the diameter, but I was feeling lazy and didn’t want to bust out the calculator, so I just cut out a bunch of 4″ strips until they went all the way around the circle. (probably easier to times the diameter by 2.14) Then I used a bazillion pins to match up the circle to the side seam and sewed them together, leaving an opening for turning and stuffing.
The next step is to make the petals. The instructions don’t say how big the make the circles so I used a cereal bowl as my template (I am guessing it’s about 5″ in diameter- I don’t think you need to know the circumference, but now you know how to find out). And I started cutting them out. The pattern says you need 63 circles, but I ran out of fabric and only ended up with 55.
You fold the circles in half- the pattern is WRONG and says to put them wrong sides together- they need to be right sides together. Then stitch around them. I chain stitched them to go faster.
You will end up with a mess like this.
Next you trim the sewn edges 1/4″ (I used pinking shears) cut a small slit in the bottom (folded side), turn them right side out, (I used a blunt skewer to push the edges out), press the petals flat, then sew a gathering stitch on the flat side of most of the petals (leave about 20 ungathered). The next part of the fun is to try to hand sew the petals on the pillow. one…at…a…time………..do you remember that there are about 60 petals?………………….do you remember how big this pillow is?…………………do you remember that you only have about a 5″ opening to put your hand in to try to guide the needle to the right place in the petal?……………………………………Do you remember that the pattern said this should all take about 3 – 3 1/2 hours, which we passed about 3 hours ago?……………………….Do you remember when you could still feel the top of your thumb?…………………..No?, me either…………………….Reveal to come shortly- after I can feel my thumb again.

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