Christmas Pillows

The town near where I live has a great farmers' market every Saturday morning from 8am to noon which starts up in May on Mother's Day weekend and ends on the last weekend of October. We look forward to our weekly trip to the market. My husband gets a cup of coffee and we visit all the vendors to pick out the groceries we need to the week. Mid summer brings the chance to try all kinds of unusual foods which we can't always find at the grocery store...purple cauliflower, several types of zucchini, a rainbow of peppers, carrots, beets....the list goes on. It is a great place to see the people we know, visit a while, and support local farmers and businesses.

This Saturday is the annual Christmas market...many of the usual vendors will be there along with others selling locally made crafts and gift items.  A couple of months ago, Christine and I decided to rent a table at the market and sell quilted pillows.  I have been busy making Christmas pillows and Christine is making Canada flag pillows to celebrate Canada's 150th birthday next summer.  

First, I made some snowman pillows. Each pillow is unique and all were designed by me. I did not use any patterns to make the pillows. 

Next, I made some Christmas trees in three different colour ways...red, light green and medium green.  

I also made some rectangular tree pillows. 

I quilted some with organic wavy lines, some with straight lines and some with a fancy stitch on my sewing machine.  It was fun playing with different colours of threads and quilting designs! 

This week, I made some wonky star pillows.  I like the way the brightly coloured stars look on the dark linen fabric.  I made a couple of star pillows with a lighter coloured fabric as well.  

 The background fabric on all my pillows is Essex linen and they have a zipper closure on the backs so that the covers can be easily removed and washed if necessary. This also makes it easy to change the covers seasonally. All the raw edges inside the pillows are finished with a zigzag stitch.  

Here is one of Christine's pillows.  

  The Horton Farmers' Market is located between Horton and Manitoba Streets, half a block north of Talbot Street in St. Thomas, Ontario, Canada. The Christmas Market is open officially from 8am to noon but I have been told that shoppers arrive as early as 7:30am.  We hope to see some of you who live in the area at the market this Saturday...please stop by and say hello.  I will be wearing a Santa hat...