Here is a little project to spring up your home.  I made this pillow in springy greens, but any colors would of course work. Ticking would look very nice, with the stripes going opposite ways. The pillow is based on a simple quilt square (does it have a name?) and comes together super fast.  Happy Spring!

color block pillow

materials:

• two squares of fabric slightly larger than your pillow
• square pillow form
• zipper slightly smaller than your pillow

directions:

1.  Cut your fabric 2 inches larger than your pillow. For example: my pillow was 13in square, so I cut my fabric into 15in squares.

2. Put the squares together, right sides facing. Using a straight edge, draw a line diagonally across the fabric. No one will see the line, so you can use a regular pencil or pen.

3. Sew 1/4in from the line. First sew on one side of the line, and then on the other. You will have two seams, one on each side of the line. This is shown more clearly in the photo below.

4. Cut directly on the line you drew.

5. Ta Da! You now have two squares. Open them up and press the seam to one side–the side with the darker colored fabric.

6. Now you have a choice. You can line the squares up, right sides facing, with the seams also alined like I did in the photo above. Or you can arrange it so the triangles are oriented differently on each side–the seams will not line up, but will make an X. Play around with it and see what you like. But unless you have a clear fiberglass couch no one is going to see both sides at once.

7. I am not going to explain how to do the zipper, because there is a good tutorial that does it already–Sewing 101: Zippered Throw Pillows. This is the method I use for putting zippers in pillows and it is dead easy. There are other ways that look a bit nicer, but this one is super fast and hard to screw up. I encourage you to try it if you haven’t used zippers before–you will succeed, I know it!

8. Try the pillow on your pillow form. It might need some taking in. I had to take mine off and sew it a bit smaller to make it fit. Hey look, you’re done! And you made a super chic, color block, geometric, trendy as all get out pillow. Your couch will thank you.

The idea (and pattern and color scheme) for this potholder came from Martha Stewart. This whole potholer thing started because I needed to respect the work I do in my home. Martha Stewart seems to have abandoned that cause.

When I pick up her magazine these days, there is not a lot of substance in it. My back copies of Living have survived many basement clean ups–and subsequent trips to the dump. When I get one out to read I always discover some in depth article about cleaning cloths, or glue, or the mudroom. That is only a sampling from February back issues.  The magazine didn’t used to cater to hipster whims, but rather to a wide swath of people who would like their daily chores recast as an art they can refine. Granted Martha Stewart can get a little crazy, but all in all she has taken homemaking to a higher level of sophistication.

She may have failed me as a homemaking superstar, but she makes nice potholders. It is just a simple log cabin block, quilted. I eyeballed the measurement and it came out pretty nice.

I’d love to know your opinions about Martha and her empire, because I know you’ve got some.

That last potholder grew out of a need for mindfulness in my life. This one, on the other hand, was sewn out of jealously. If you follow the lovely Kayanna on instagram (@junecraft) you already know about the amazing quilt she’s making. Every other day or so another quilt square sewn in bold colors and milky pastels would pop up on my feed and I would freak out. I mean look at this!

Quilting is not my strong suit, but the block was too pretty to pass up. Freshly Pieced has a fantastic tutorial on how to put this block together. She also has a template to print out that you sew directly onto so everything comes out perfectly. I did not print it out (as you probably can tell). The finished quilt square was much too big for a potholder, so I cut the pieces much smaller. Why I didn’t just shrink the template too is beyond me. The lazy man works twice as hard–and stays up sewing late into the night.

This kind of quilt square is incredibly fiddly, but also immensely satisfying when it comes together. In the future I might even have the urge–and possibly the patience–to make a whole quilt. My scrap pile would like that time to come sooner rather than later. Or maybe I could go into the potholder business, because–just so you know–it’s pretty much potholders from here on out.

I made a bunch of potholders recently. I thought this little project would help me get my sewing mojo back and also make the kitchen a more welcoming place.

My intention was not so much “buy a cute and funny little scrubbie so washing dishes is SUPER FUN!!”  I’m trying to respect the job it is I do. Motherhood, housekeeping, much of anyone’s time really is errands and tasks and doing the damn laundry again. We’re told, especially as young mothers, that scheduling “me time” is supposed to erase the stress and monotony of our daily chores, but forced relaxation isn’t going to change the fact that there is laundry to be done.

It’s not that I’m horribly uptight and unable to relax–most evening you will find me on the couch–it’s that all of these things are a huge part of my life. I can’t put them all in the category ” things that need to be done before I can live my real life.” Some people, as Stephinine said, “border […] on poetry when they write about doing laundry or mending clothing.” I will never truly feel enlightening scraping oatmeal out of the bottom of the pan, but I can respect my roll as a caregiver and bring some joy to the tasks that come with being a mother.  My gnarly ass potholders told me my job as a mother was secondary; this silly star potholder says otherwise.

On a completely different note, elsie marley now has its own Facebook page. I know lots of you use Facebook to keep up with blogs, so now you can follow me there too!