Exciting news!

So how fun was the first day of Christmas in July?! Who's already working on some quilted holiday cards or a paper pieced snowflake table runner/wall hanging?! And don't forget that you can enter the giveaway on Jessica's tutorial for a chance at a JOY charm pack!

And now I have some more news!

Back in March I was hard at work in the Pillow Talk Swap, making my partner a pillow of clamshells. I decided to be brave and submitted my project idea to Fat Quarterly [which is oddly nerve-wracking even though it was just over the Internet and not face-to-face with possible rejection]. If you're not familiar with this publication, it's an e-zine run by 5 fabulous quilters, and publishes...wait for it...quarterly. Plus they do bonus editions all the time, like the one out right now, which is focused around the Fat Quarterly retreat that just happened!

So I think that some of the coolest things about Fat Quarterly is that it's online, so you get instant gratification when you want it. Plus it's only $8, and is loaded full of projects. Legit. That's like the price of one regular pattern. But you get MORE patterns. That's math I like to do, people. And even though it's online, you can preview the projects before you buy it! And they put pictures of those projects up on their Flickr. It just gets better and better, amIright?!

So anyways, all gushing aside, my project was accepted a few months ago. Yay!

I've had many people email me and ask for a pattern for the pillow, and I've had to be vague and say no. I felt terrible every time. So here you go, everyone! A pattern! For you to make your very own crazy clamshell pillow.

Issue 10 of Fat Quarterly will be released at the end of July and is all about the Olympics and pageantry and royalty and England. Specifically the theme is "Rule Britannia." I love the Olympics, and I personally know an Olympic runner [she just qualified for the London games yay! Jenny and I ran cross country together in high school and she's the world champion in the 1500 m!], so I think it's a pretty cool theme. 

I re-made the pillow in jewel tones and the pattern comes with probably more pictures then you will ever need to make the pillow cover. In fact, the pattern comes with 42 pictures. And, after sewing the 54+ curves that make up the clamshell part of the pillow, there's no way you won't be a pro. Don't let those curves scare you though, because I walk you through everything nice and easy!

Also, I love all the free-motion quilting that I did! It was so fun!

So, mark your calendars, because I'm sure this will be a super fun issue, even if my project wasn't in it. But since it is, the issue will be that much better ;)

*Linked with Quilt Story