Photo Pillow

I wanted to do something special for my stepmom and I found the perfect idea - a photo pillow!! This is the process I went through...

1. I bought a square pillow from JoAnns. If you are making one for yourself, you can just use a pillow you already have. For some reason, I seem to have random little pillows lying around that I can use if I make one for myself.
2. I bought 4 fabrics that I thought would go well in her house (2 for the front of the pillow and 2 for the back). I only got a 1/4 yard of each which was more than enough.
   
3. I found 2 pictures to put on the pillow (1 on the front and one on the back) and printed them on fabric paper that goes in the printer. The fabric paper can be expensive so stock up when it is on sale if you want to do a lot of gifts like this.
4. I had an idea of what I wanted the pillow to look like so I drew out different possible combinations and finally figured out how much fabric to cut for each side. I used extra fabric to make sure I had enough for my 14x14" pillow. The tricky part was having one picture that was 6x6" and the other picture was 5x7". This meant that I had to figure out different panel sizes for each side which was not that big of a deal but added a bit more time. I realize that my math skills need some honing!
5. I sewed all of the fabric pieces together. The last piece was a little tricky to make come together smoothly but I did not sweat it too much. I then cut the extra fabric off and made sure the front and back measured 14.5x14.5" to account for seam allowances. Don't get too crazy here... after all, it is just a pillow and you can just pull a little tighter or squash the pillow down if it is not perfect.
   
6. I sewed the front to the back on 3 sides and used a cool trim on the sides. I had actually planned on using the trim all the way around but did not have enough.
7. I really had a hard time figuring out how to close off the 4th side. I was too lazy to whipstitch it so I thought a zipper would be easy and functional since we could give my stepmom new covers for the pillow in the future. Well, I don't know what I did wrong but the zipper gave me a huge fit! I don't know if it was a problem because I was trying to fit it in between two closed off ends or what, but I am definitely reading up more on pillows before I do my next one. In the end, it came out really cute and my stepmom loved it.
   

Crabby pants

Yes, redheads can be a bit crabby at times but that is not what I am talking about here. :) I found this fun fabric at the Chez Ami warehouse here in town and fell in love with it. We are going to have a lot of fun with these shorts this summer!
The shorts were made from a McCall's pattern that was tagged "Easy" and the pattern really was easy! If you are looking for a good pattern to try out sewing shorts/pants for the first time, this is it! Stay tuned for matching dresses in the same fabric for Gabe's sisters!!!
The only thing that really confused me is that I figured out you need to top-stitch the non-existent zipper area, but I could not find that anywhere in the pattern. Hmmmm. I am sure I missed it but I don't know how!