Potholder fail lesson becomes making a cute pillow!

New techniques. Always fun to try, but not so much fun to fail!

I saw a lovely hexagon project where the hex was cut into 6 pieces and then strip pieced before being pieced into the final hexagon shape. Hey, I can do that! I rustled up some primary colors from my marbled solids and made bias binding from a rainbow colored fabric. My plan was to make a hot pad, so I cut a hex for the backing and some InsulBright for the batting. And I failed. But I know why - the 1-1/2" strips must not have been cut fussy enough, the seams must not have been consistent enough, and the matching of the strips upon construction of the hexagon was off. Here's the fail:

Yuck! I started to do the binding and then just gave up. The matchy matchy parts that worked are very good, but the ones that don't match so well, they sort of stand out like a sore thumb. 

Here's the better version (you can click these photos for larger pictures):
I decided to go for another try, using a modified log cabin type of piecing. I started with a small hexagon and strip pieced the ROYGBV around it. What I didn't take into consideration was that it would not be a balanced hexagon using that method. This one wasn't such a fail, though, so I got a piece of recycled denim and appliqued the now primary color flower via machine using variegated thread. Before I satin stitched the bottom, I added a piece of the rainbow bias tape I had made and called it a stem. I made some corded piping with the bias tape and added that around the edge, but not before I used the basic flower/snowflake function of my Bernina to add a little something around the edge of the flower. I used non-bias rainbow fabric for the back and stuffed it with PolyFil. It's no hot pad, but it's a cute 8" x 11" pillow.

The bottom line is that I practiced making bias tape and the piping, and used the embroidery feature of my machine, which hasn't been used in forever. I also took what I called a fail out of the trash and made a dog throw out of it.

Even when I screw up a little bit, I'm learning something and I'm sewing. the creative muse gets put to work whether I want it to or not!