Halloween and Owl Pillowcases

I'd made Halloween pillowcases for my granddaughter and grandson who live in Oklahoma (post dated 5/11/19), but I did not have enough of any one Halloween fabric in my stash to make a pair of king-size pillowcases for their parents' bed. I ordered some themed fabric online from the Missouri Star Quilt company but did not think it would arrive before I had to leave for Oklahoma. I had taken a screenshot of the fabric I'd ordered and, based on a printout of the screen shot, had tentatively picked the coordinating fabric from my stash for the borders and accent band, to sew when I got home. I picked a purple to go with the stripe and an orange/yellow to go with the windows and jack o' lanterns' features. The purple as a marbled print gives the feeling of spider webs. The harlequin print had yellow-shaded-to-orange shapes so I thought it might play up the eyes of the pumpkins and windows of the houses.

I suppose I could have had the feature fabric shipped to my daughter's in Oklahoma and brought my coordinating purple and orange along with me in my suitcase; however, I was not confident enough that fabrics selected based on a printout of a screenshot of a monitor image would be adequate color matches or blends. As it turns out, once I returned home and compared the real fabric to my selections, I was surprised at how well the trial coordinates worked. No worries however. Halloween is months away and I had plenty of time to make these pillowcases. But I knew there was a good chance I might forget, or procrastinate, or store the components in an obscure, irretrievable location. So I did them now. The feature fabric is Hocus Pocus by City Art Studio for Henry Glass & Co., Inc. The selvage on the feature fabric is adorable with its ghosts in 18 different colors flitting along the edge.

The pillowcases are king-sized. In the photo below each is folded in half lengthwise but is shown full width. I was careful to add the borders on opposite ends so when the pillowcases are on the bed, each has the purple border to the outside while the stripe is oriented upright.

Look closely. Upright means the bats are hanging upside down.

I had prepared two other pillowcase kits, with striped and owl prints, to take out to Oklahoma with me in case the kids really got into sewing. The doll blankets and pillows were enough to hold their interest and give my patience a sufficient workout that I elected to bring the pre-prepped kits home with me. Before I forgot and lost momentum, I sewed them up as well. (Pillowcases tend to be a low-energy project suitable for maintaining productivity while recovering from travel.) The selvages on these were informative but no where near as much fun as those on the Henry Glass fabric.

  

On this pair I put on my thinking cap to make sure I oriented the striped border on one pillowcase to slant in the same ordered sequence as the body on the mated pillowcase. From the top downward, the stripe color order on both is pink, blue, green, yellow. I can be picky, but I think these small details keep even the most mundane project interesting. Each pillowcase in the following photo is folded in half lengthwise and then in thirds widthwise.

Here is the pair of cases in their true proportions on the bed. I think these will stay at Grandma's house to be used when somebody visits. That's not to say they might not hitchhike home in somebody's suitcase... 🙂

Cowboy + Cowgirl + Granddaughter

I have made a similar pair of these cowboy and cowgirl dolls before and given them to my Southern California grandchildren. The design is by Stacy Iest Hsu and each panel comes with the doll, his/her attire, a blanket, a pillow, and a hobby horse. I included photos of the source fabric panels and an outline of the dolls' assembly in my post dated 12/21/17.

In this post I am making another set for my 6 year old granddaughter and my nearly 4 year old grandson who live in Oklahoma. I pre-made the dolls to take out there with me when I visit this month. I also made and stuffed the hobby horses. Here the horse heads are inverted and held in place by glasses while I added glue to help the dowels stay in place. The glasses also kept them in that upside down orientation while the glue dried.

For this set of dolls, I left the flat accessories cut out only and waiting to be finished so the kids could help me sew them. In my suitcase I took out with me the blankets, batting, and backing all trimmed to size so the kids, with the help of me or their mom, would just need to sew around and turn the "quilt" right side out. The pillows they could sew around, turn right side out, and stuff and then I would stitch up the opening.

I was noticing that the cowgirl's blanket is somewhat smaller than the cowboy's. I think that is because there was also a skirt and a belt to be made out of the panel.

The pillows are the same size though.

Taking the quilts and pillows out to Oklahoma, my 6 year old granddaughter and I spent part of Sunday afternoon, Father's Day in a sewing lesson. Autumn has been exposed to sewing before by her mom. She made a skirt documented for posterity on my daughter's RobinLovesQuilting blog post dated 4/23/19.

"I [her mom] handled all the ironing and cutting, but she [Autumn] helped put the pins in, and she managed the fabric (with help) as it went through the machine. Her main job was to pull the pins out as we sewed, and by the end it was a job she performed with gusto."

Here I explained a bit more about machine features, having her operate the needle-up and needle-down function and having her practice lowering – not dropping – the pressure foot.

She was a serious listener and we started on sewing the pillow first – right sides together and leaving an opening. "Why?" she asked. "So we can turn the right sides out," I say. "You'll see."

She was pleased when she saw how it all worked.

Then we did the quilt for the girl doll. I showed her how I layered the top and bottom, right sides together, and added a layer of batting. She was thrilled to sew through all that.

She concentrated very hard to turn the quilted layers right sides out and was dedicated to getting those corners poked out just so.

She was proud of her accomplishment and I told her she was not finished until it was quilted. She said, "You do it Grandma. I don't want to mess it up." I said, "Oh, no! You are not going to do what I did, being afraid to quilt a quilts for fear of ruining it. If you mess it up, we will just take it out and do it again." I wish I had been that firm with myself.  My fear lasted months and still lingers a bit to this day. I wanted to start her off right. Autumn sewed straight lines on the printed borders between the checks and did just great. I pretty much let her do it herself although I nervously hovered my hands closely over her hands, not wanting a stray finger to slip beneath the needle.

Like all us quilters do, she is taking time to admire her handiwork.

Those lines on the cowgirl's quilt were pretty darn straight, too, I might point out proudly. She stuffed both pillows, but I completed the cowboy's quilt with the curvy lines.

Mission accomplished, although I think she confiscated her little brother's doll in the process. Isaiah did not mind at all. He liked his two sided robot pillow just fine (post dated 6/9/19).

That night her doll was posed on her bed. Autumn had updated the fashion a bit. The skirt came off and that bandana became a sarong tied over a fuzzy pair of shorts beneath.

According to the designer, Stacy Hsu, the cowboy's name is Westly and the cowgirl's name is Madeline. Autumn had other ideas. Earlier in the day I had been reading her a chapter from a book titled My Father's Dragon. In one chapter, six little monkeys used magnifying glasses to locate and remove fleas from a gorilla. They were named Rosie, Rhoda, Rachel, Ruthie, Ruby, and Roberta.

That night in bed Autumn asked me if I remembered the names of the six monkeys and did I know which name was her favorite? I said I could not be sure so would she tell me. She unequivocally stated it was Rosie and therefore she was going to name her cowgirl doll Rosie. "Besides," she told me, "it matches the roses on her quilt!"

I had a crush on sewing with my granddaughter during our visit, so to share the love, I am linking up with MCM #158 at Cooking Up Quilts.