This pattern, Welcome Home Pillow by Lynette Anderson Designs was purchased several years ago from Cross Patch here in the UK. I've used a piece of background fabric from my "Lynette" box of fabrics for the stitchery. A piece of lightweight interfacing has been fused to the back, and the design traced using a lightbox and a Micron Pigma pen with a very fine nib - my favourite is size 005 in a pale brown colour. I'm using a selection of DMC straded embroidery threads, in colours that were suggested in the pattern, with just a couple of substitutions. I always use a wooden hoop for my hand embroidery, to keep the fabric taut. This pattern uses very simple embroidery stitches, mostly back stitch, cross stitch, lazy daisy stitch. These sheep are filled with Colonial knots (I find these asier than French knots) which makes them look very woolly...
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...the house, with it's embroidered veranda and windows, is hand appliqued into place. I've picked out 3 fabrics from Lynette's High Meadow Farm collection for the patchwork squares - these have been in my stash for several years so it was about time I put them to good use. These were also purchased from Cross Patch way back in 2017 as a bundle of fat eighths - they'd been packed away in one of my "Lynette" boxes of fabrics, and when I toook part in the Declutter Challenge earlier this year they were rediscovered - and this was the perfect project for them...
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...the patchwork squares were machine pieced together and machine quilted using a dark green Aurifil 40wt thread. I've used a piece of fusible Vlieseline H630 for the wadding, that was leftover from a previous project. The embroidered panel was then pressed on a wool pressing mat with a warm iron, and hand appliqued into place on top of the quilted pillow front. I've used one of the feature prints from the High Meadow Farm collection for the back of the cushion - this has been lined with another print that was included in the bundle of fat eighths. As you can see, I've used the same neutral patterned fabric for the top half that I used for the stichery panel on the front of the cushion, and I've hand embroidered the name of the pillow, Welcome Home, along with my name...
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...once the back and front were assembled with a zipper fastening, I've added a narrow double fold binding to cover all the raw edges. After machining this to the front of the cushion, the binding was then folded over to the back, and stitched in place by hand using a ladder stitch. I do love a stripey binding! This was constructed using a different method to the one in the original pattern, as I like to be able to remove my covers incase they need to be laundered...
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...and here's my completed Welcome Home Pillow - I've filled it with a soft feather pillow. I always use pillow forms that are a couple of inches bigger than the size of the cover, to keep it looking plump. I'm hoping the recipient will enjoy this one as much as I enjoyed making it!
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