Sunday, December 16, 2012

Bouquet of hexagons

Recently, a friend and faithful reader of this blog had to have major surgery.  Given that she lives on the left coast and I live in fly over territory, I couldn't visit her in the hospital or bring her dinners when she got out.  I thought about sending her chocolates or flowers, but both only last a little while.  Then I remembered she had really admired the hexagon flowers I've been making.  I decided to make her a pillow to match the quilt I made her a few years ago, something that would bring her comfort and joy since I couldn't be there myself.

I started working on the flowers here and there, but it was taking too long.  One morning I decided I was just going to get 'er done.  I put on TV shows for Petite Mademoiselle and sat and hand stitched ALL day.  By the end of the day, my fingers were numb, but I had 7 hexagon flowers sewn together.  I'm now rethinking my plan for the rest of the hexagons, but this pillow turned out perfectly.

 I FMQ'd the background in a dense loopy pattern.  I appliquéd the hexagons to the background before I quilted it, so they are a little puffy and stand out nicely from the background.
I used binding leftover from my friend's quilt.  You just can't get any better than that Neopolitan stripe.