Scrappy Hexie Pillow

Hooray!  Another long-term WIP knocked out: some English paper-pieced hexagons.

Over two years ago, I (temporarily) caught the hexie bug-- it looked so simple, and people's inspirational results were so pretty.

I gathered together scraps, basted them to the paper templates during a massive tv binge session, and put them in a ziplock bag.  Whenever I needed some hand work, I could pull them out.

But hand-stitching together hexagons takes me forever, and at a certain point, I just wanted to be done with them.  You have to be committed!

So, mine stopped at an 18x18 inch pillow size.

The result: a bright, fun, scrappy pillow! The fabrics are an eclectic mix of old favorites and some very special scraps, almost like an I-Spy quilt.

Each hexagon is hand-pieced, and I added an off-white border and a layer of batting underneath them.  With my machine (thank goodness, at this point), I quilted the pillow top in zig zags along the seam lines - tons of stopping and pivoting!

I frequently like to construct pillows so that they have a little flappy edge (what else to call it?) beyond the pocket, and this one measures just about 3/4 inch.

It is bound like a quilt, too, with an older Kate Spain (Central Park?) vine stripe, which I think complements the cheerful brightness of the hexies.

The back envelope closure is made of softest off-white upholstery fabric, and I trimmed the pocket to match the binding.

Just adorable! If you're interested in tackling your own English Paper-Piecing project, there are tons of free tutorials and templates out there.  A great place to start is this post at The Sometimes Crafter, where there is not only a tutorial but also a list of additional resources from around the stitchy web.