Polka Dot Pumpkin Pillow

Since Kyle’s been traveling quite a bit for work, we decided to turn his long weekend in Austin into a mini vacation. Naturally, every trip we go on has moments, places, or experiences that come to define it. Barcelona is Gaudi’s Cathedral, Venice is blown glass and bellinis, Sidney is The Rocks Market, The Cayman Islands is scuba diving, Los Cabos is the beach, Amsterdam is… exactly what you’d expect. And Austin will without a doubt be food. More specifically, meat. And most specifically, BBQ. Foolish Boston girl that I am, I’ve always thought of BBQ as a sauce. To the contrary, it’s a slow and steady way of cooking meat that turns it into the most tender, juicy deliciousness you can imagine– and it’s served without plates, without forks, and definitely without sauce. No pictures does it justice– you’ll just have to trust me on this one. But I digress…

Per usual, I took along some hand stitching on my trip. Vacation just isn’t the same without some sewing to keep me occupied in spare moments. I never go with a set amount that I have to complete; when on vacation, it’s about the pleasure of stitching, just for fun and just to relax. Since my autumn obsession continues, I decided to go for a festive fall theme.

This one’s straight from the Pippa Patchwork MO: regular and reverse applique to make two-toned circles. However, while the pumpkin and polka dots are all Kona cotton as usual, I used a linen for the backing fabric instead.

Some friends gave me a gift card to Greys Fabric many months ago, and I finally got around to visiting last week when I ran out of solid gray fabric. It’s a charming little Boston store, and it’s stocked with plenty of solids so I almost went for my usual cotton, but the linen caught my eye and I decided to break out of my mold. It has such a wonderful weight and softness to it. As I expected, it was lovely for hand stitching– I’ll definitely be adding this to my fabric arsenal.

I actually just finished prepping my next hand stitching project since I’m off to Houston Quilt Market on Friday. If you’ll be there, visit me at the Martingale Booth at 2 pm on Saturday or 10:30 am on Sunday for book signing! I’m looking forward to experiencing this event from a new perspective, and meeting (again and for the first time) fellow folks in the quilt biz. And of course, those spare moments of hand stitching.