A few weeks ago, a friend of mine told me about her plan to make a 'no-sew blanket' for a friend of hers having a baby... Once she described what you do, I had the crazy idea that the same process would TOTALLY work around a pillow!
And that's when it all started...
I was super keen (as I usually am with a new craft idea) to start immediately, but what do I make these pillows for? We have a puppy who has already chewed through the pillows we had, so they couldn't really be for our couch... Then the 'A-Ha' moment came! We had a wedding coming up!! After some sneaky (or maybe not so) questions to the groom about colours they both liked and disliked, I came up with a rough plan in my head of what I wanted to do. In my thoughts of these no-sew pillows, I wanted (as usual) to make it a little more personal... I thought that I could somehow sew (which defeats the purpose of this project being 'no-sew', really) their names INTO the fleece, then perhaps a heart, or the date they were getting married and such... So many ideas, right!
So once finding out that blue and red were colours that neither the bride or groom particularly disliked, I went out, bought a couple of pillows and red & blue coloured and patterned fleece. Hmm... Now what?
Okay, so I measured the pillow, then measured the fleece (I knew I needed about 10cm extra on each side for the knotting), and did some cutting, then had to start sewing on the names and hearts... SO time consuming! And when I did it by hand it was scrappy and wonky... *sad face* ... I figured I needed a sewing machine.
Okay, so I measured the pillow, then measured the fleece (I knew I needed about 10cm extra on each side for the knotting), and did some cutting, then had to start sewing on the names and hearts... SO time consuming! And when I did it by hand it was scrappy and wonky... *sad face* ... I figured I needed a sewing machine.
Thankfully, my mum is wonderful and let me borrow hers! I actually had this sewing machine on my table for 4 days before I actually used it... And on the 4th day, it was the night before the wedding, so I pretty much had no choice but to start if I wanted the pillows made (both in time, or ever).
The groom's name is Nick, and the bride's name is Kysha (if that wasn't already obvious). I had the crazy idea of combining their names into "NICKYSHA". Clever, right? .. I didn't end up going with it, but seeing as Nick ends in K, and Kysha starts with K, I figured it would mean one less K to cut out of the fleece...
Online, I found outlines of block letters that I used for the pillows. I printed out the letters in their names, the numbers in the date of the wedding, and some different sized hearts. I cut them out, placed them onto the fleece, cut them out AGAIN, and then got started with the placement of them on the pillows, and then the sewing... I also didn't end up sticking with the '&' in between Nick and Kysha's names... That was far too much turning and twisting with the sewing machine! I used a '+' instead :)
Once all the letters, hearts, and numbers were sewn onto the fleeces, I was so totally relieved I could finally start with the cutting and the NO-sew part of the present! But since I was sewing things on to it, I don't think it can hold that title.
So, I placed the fleeces together...
Measured them up against the pillow...
And started cutting strips along the sides of the fleeces! Each strip was about 10cm long, and 2cm wide. But. It was 1am by this stage, so measurements may have not been completely exact.
I cut the corners out so that the pillows remained square-ish, and so there wasn't untidy corners with extra knots and material with nothing to do :)
Then the knotting began! I tied one knot in all the strips around the pillow, then went back around to tie a second knot in them all.
Once the first pillow was done, I started with the second pillow, which had the same big heart on one side, but the date of the wedding on the other, with two smaller hearts to fill in the massive space left.
Then the knotting was finished! Which means the pillows were finished! And still 9 hours to spare until the wedding started... HA!
Sometimes the wonky look shows that it was made with love... EXTRA love. In fact, some people pay MONEY to DELIBERATELY make it look like that. Which is totally why I did it that way. It wasn't because it was my first time sewing or anything. I am a domesticated housewife of superior prowess and... Ah, even I can't keep that up. It's wonky because it's hard!
Many congratulations again to the lovely couple. I hope you enjoy these pillows now that you know the back story into how they were made! :)
Brilliant!
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