Quick Patchwork Pillow

As I mentioned in my last post I have developed a strategy for reducing the amount of stuff in our house. One of my House On a Diet strategies is to use up things. This patchwork pillow is made entirely of fabric leftover from other projects. I started with this pattern which is a freebie from allpeoplequilt.com.

The finished pillow will be one of my contributions to a silent auction where the bidders are Girl Scout volunteers raising money for our local Girl Scout council. In my fabric stash I have some fabric that was once used to make Brownie Girl Scout uniforms. I found it on the flat fold table at a fabric store a few years after that particular uniform was phased out and I have had it for around 15 years. A couple years ago, for the silent auction, I made pillow cases and used my vintage uniform fabric to trim them. They sold for around $50!

To coordinate with the Brownie fabric I used this brown background, woodsy-themed fabric (sorry I have no idea what the fabric is called) that was left over from a baby quilt I made a few years back. The fabric features several different animals but I concentrated on using owls. If you're familiar with the Brownie Story you know that an important character just happens to be an owl. That made the fabric not only the perfect color, but an appropriate choice for the Brownie theme. I was able to use some of the other fabric scraps from that quilt as well as fabric left over from the pillow cases mentioned above to complete the patchwork. Here is the front of the pillow:

The pattern calls for an envelope-style back for the pillow but I made a flat back for the pillow and was able to use some patchwork blocks that were also left over from the baby quilt for extra interest on the back. Here is the back of the pillow:

I am pretty happy with how the pillow turned out and I am especially happy to put my leftovers to use. If you have fabric scraps from other projects that you would like to use, this pattern is a good choice as it uses small pieces of several different fabrics.