My lovely mother-in-law has turned 70! Incredible, but true!
She is such a warm and caring person with a wonderful, bubbly personality. Her (extremely) high energy-level takes our breath away from time to time, and after she retired from her job as a teacher, she is involved in more projects than ever. And she is not one to fiddle about with minor details....Grand and important causes like World Peace and Preserving the Environment are at the top of her list, and I admire her immensely for her strong commitment and tireless work to make important changes in the world.
I wanted to make her something special and personal for her big day. Something that would tell her how much I appreciate her, but also something to remind her to slow down a bit from time to time....
After a long and busy life working fulltime as a teacher, and raising 3 children as a single mum, she now deserves to enjoy a slower and calmer life (although I don't know if a calm life actually would make her happy.....)
Anyway, I figured that a big, soft and cosy cushion would be the perfect symbol of relaxation and "slow living", and since her favourite colours are all shades of blue, green and purple, this would have to be the colourscheme I'd go for. Bright blues and greens are not colours I use very often myself, but for my mother-in-law there's just no other option. These are her colours! Bright and strong just like her lovely self ❤
I had a picture in my mind of a big cushion bursting with flowers in all shades of blue, reminding her to take the time to "stop and smell the roses"...
So off I went "flowerscouting" for just the right ones for this joyous project. Google is a good and effecient friend when it comes to finding inspiration, so after a few searches online, I found the perfect flower for this lovely person. What could be better for mye bubbly mother-in-law than Popcorn flowers? Both the name and the look of these lovelies are perfect for her! The best part is that these flowers are so fun and easy to make, and I found a great tutorial right here.
The flowers literally pop out of the pillow like a vibrant meadow of blue flowers. So from now on this cushion is known as "The Blue Meadow Cushion". Sounds like a lovely, relaxing dream does'nt it?
It was so much fun picking the colours and making all these lovely flowers, and the excitement and love you feel when working on a unique design dedicated to a special person make the whole creative prosess even better! I love making gifts especially made for the receiver - it's just so much better and personal when you have a special person in mind for your creation ❤
So, enough talk! This is how the Popcorn-flowers turned out. Rather lovely and cheerful, aren't they ?
The stack of squares increased day by day, and for a 60 x 60 cm cushion I figured I would have to make 25 happy flower squares.
It is starting to come together nicely:
All 25 finished and laid out to be admired in the sun ❤
This is the best part of the whole making! Joining the sqares and see how all the colours and forms come together is always exciting, and in this case the result came out exactly as I had pictured it in my mind. Yeah!!
I chose the Flat Braid joining method for this pillow, and you can watch a great tutorial right here if this is unfamiliar territory for you. This is ( at the time...) by far my most preferred method of joining squares, whether it is for afghans/blankets or pillows. The result is very elegant and seamless, and the lovely braided pattern is a nice detail to the finished product.
Hm, what to do with the back?
I had originally decided to go for a solid coloured backside, but after having worked with all these beautiful shades of blue and green for days, using just one colour seemed to dull...
So I ended up using all the colours from the flowers in one big granny square...(I did regret it a bit after finishing, and if this pillow were for myself I would have gone for the one colour, or at least I would have have left out the light blue colour. This single light stripe seems a bit out of place in this calm and toned down pattern.
But, this little, bright stripe certainly makes a lot of itself standing out in this muted tone-in-tone colourcombo, so I decided to keep it. The symbolism here suits my mother-in-law perfectly: a bright, shining ray of light standing out from the crowd making a stand ❤
Ta-dah!
Finally, The Blue Meadow Pillow in all its blue glory! I'm VERY happy with it, and might start on a version for myself as well....
(But that would have to be in something soft pink and beige, maybe with some sparkling silver added to it for a a little "bling"...? Hmm, must put this on my "must-make" list for later....and make it soner rather than later....)
Finally, The Blue Meadow Pillow in all its blue glory! I'm VERY happy with it, and might start on a version for myself as well....
(But that would have to be in something soft pink and beige, maybe with some sparkling silver added to it for a a little "bling"...? Hmm, must put this on my "must-make" list for later....and make it soner rather than later....)
❤ Live - Laugh - Love ❤
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