Wooly Fun, Part One

Last summer, I was intrigued by a post on PatSloan'sBlog for a crazy quilted wooly pincushion. The project was based on a book by JoAnn Mullalley (go here for JoAnn's blog and here to order her book) and was a featured product over at Brenda's PumpkinPatchPrimitivesQuiltShoppe. Pat was hosting a Pincushion round robin pincushion exchange that would feature her work, JoAnn's stitching, along with Brenda and Roseanne of Rosebud'sCottage.  It was fun to watch their pincushions develop.  I "knew" Brenda from my Wooly*Buddies Yahoo group, so I e-mailed her and said that if she ever did another Round Robin, I would love it if she'd consider me. She replied that she was planning a second one and so I was in!  You can read the post where I began my project here and today, I can report that my Round Robin piece is finished and is now the lid on a sewing box...........

So who made what on this wooly piece?  After stitching my base, I made the stalk of corn and then my piece went off to Brenda in New Hampshire who added the face of Scarecrow Jack and some pumpkins. The pumpkins are from JoAnn's book WoolCrazy and Scarecrow Jack is from a penny rug design that you can find here at Cath'sPennies blog. The next item added was that awesome barn done by  Linda Hall of PrimitivePiecesByLinda in Florida. I wasn't familiar with Lynda's work until I "met" her through Brenda. I love blogging and Facebook because you can connect with so many people that otherwise you'd never meet!  Behind the barn door is an "H" for Henderson where I live. And the barn sign is so typical of barns here in the Midwest. Just perfect!  From Florida, my piece wound it's way north to Rhode Island to Michelle of RockingChairStitches and she added the woven basket filled with apples. Perfect for our area of Minnesota!

Now if you follow my blog regularly, you may remember that I posted last summer about wooly-fun-comin-up and, yes, that's where my pincushion base began but it had a bit of a "bump" at the start.  I wanted a Fall/Harvest theme so I chose wool bits that I thought would go well with that theme. We were to add the first item and I wanted a cornstalk ready for harvest, so I snipped some wool, started stitching and I ended up with this...........

Yes, it looks like a cactus so I must have been thinking southwest instead of midwest. I decided to start over and took a photo of an Iowa cornfield so I'd get it right. You'd think I would have gotten it right the first time since I grew up in Iowa surrounded by cornstalks. LOL!  You can see the two cornstalks are vastly different.

I rather liked the cornstalk that I had stitched with the bursting ears of corn so I decided I would rip out the base and see if it could be salvaged.  The floss I used for my piece is from TheGentleArt. I absolutely love the colors that they offer!!  It was tedious to rip out the "cactus" aspect of my stalk of corn but I did it and I think it worked. And so, while my pincushion base (above) went off on it's Round Robin journey, I worked on embellishing the piece with the "cactus corn" on it.  And here it is............

Much better looking stalk of corn, don't you think?  I stayed with the Fall theme on this piece because I was already thinking of making a pincushion and a sewing box. I added the crow because crows always bothered the sweet corn my Grandma Goldie planted out on the farm. The pumpkin is the kind I tried to grow but mine were never so nicely shaped. :-)  We have one loan oak tree in our back yard that sheds an abundance of acorns. It stands all alone amidst the maple trees.  The maple leaf is also abundant in our backyard and every yard in our neighborhood. We do, after all, live on Maple Ridge. :-)  I added the basket of apples because they are also in abundance here in the Minnesota River Valley. There are several apple orchards just minutes from our house. These are all my favorite things from Fall which is my favorite season of the year. I'm must admit that after our long, cold winter that I am enjoying spring. I will tolerate summer but I live in anticipation of FALL!

In the photo above, you can see both finished pieces and I had to decide which one would become a pincushion. I really wanted to see the whole design from the piece that went off on it's Round Robin journey, so I decided that one would become the lid on the sewing box and the one that I stitched would become the pincushion. In my next post, I'll show you how I made the pincushion. Right now, I'll share tips on how I made the sewing box.

I started with a plain brown round craft box that can be found at local craft stores or online craft sources. Then I painted it. I chose a deep rich brown and painted the box inside and outside with the color which you see on the inside in the photo below. To achieve the "antiquey" look on the lid and outside of the box, I used a honey-colored paint and sponged it and rubbed it until I had the look I wanted. I let the box dry/cure for almost a week and then I sprayed it with clear matte acrylic spray. I loved the look when it was all done.

To secure the wool scene to the lid, I did the following..........
I traced the lid onto cardboard (the kind you find on the back of a tablet or use posterboard).
Then I cut three pieces of batting (Quilter'sDream poly batting) and lightly glued them to the cardboard circle.

Next, I used two strands of brown Perle cotton to sew a running stitch all the way around the stitched wool piece. See the photo above.
In the photo below, you can see that I pulled the stitching to gather it a bit.........

Next, I slipped the wool stitched piece over the batting covered-cardboard circle. Then I pulled the stitches tight and secured the Perle cotton so that it looked like what you see in the photo above.
The final step was to glue the stitched piece to the box lid............

And here it is completely finished...........

And here are the pair of them.....a finished pincushion and a finished sewing box...........

The pincushion required more patience. It is very similar in assembly to a vintage crazy quilted pincushion that my mother gave me and other pincushions that I've made. Check out this Post where you can see the vintage pincushion and the reproduction one that I made for a Crazy Quilting pincushion swap. Once you've made one pincushion, you can make more!  I can see one made in 30's prints and think I'll have to try that next!  I'll be sharing step-by-step photos for how to turn any stitched piece into a pincushion in my next post.
If you want to get started on your own wool crazy project be sure and check out JoAnn's blog and you will get inspired!
Sandi