Sofa Tidy Cushion

Several months ago, my friend Vicky handed me this denim apron and said, 'make me something with this.' I said, 'Sure! I'll have a think.' It then got put onto a back burner and half forgotten about until I started cutting up jeans for my up-cycled jeans quilt.
At the weekend I finally fished it out of its safe place and had another look at it. Turning it over and folding it this way and that until a vague idea turned into a plan which turned into a proper plan of action.
I started by focusing on the big panel of pockets, as I wanted to keep those together as one. I then chopped off the small pocket at the top and hand stitched it to the larger pocket so I had a pocket on a pocket. From the jeans quilt I had some leftovers of the lovely flannelet so decided to make the random rectangular shape of the pockets into more of a square by framing it almost (top and bottom) with strips of the flannelet, topped with extra strips of the denim from the bottom of the apron underneath where the pockets were. This is what I came up with:

It was quite practical but not overly pretty to look at so I decided that the back should be the pretty side and started playing with the scraps of denim and flannelet I was left with. As you will know from quite a lot of my projects for the ATC group I am part of, I really enjoy mini patchwork which seemed the more obvious way to go with this from the random shape and size of the scraps.

I joined and joined and joined. Stretched and pulled, placed and unplaced, then eventually my back square looked like this!!

I even managed to use the ribbon that had been the part of the apron that went around your neck.

I quite liked the scrappy look of the back of the quilted panel actually. Sort of rough and ready.

The only thing that worried me was the prospect of putting a zip in the bottom of the cushion. It quickly became apparent that there was not enough scrap fabric left for me to make an envelope back (my usual method), or even have a zip going across the centre of the back, as there wasn't enough fabric for all of the hems. So a zip at the bottom it had to be... Except that I had never put a zip in before so I was a little intimidated. Luckily Youtube once more came to the rescue and after watching several videos by experienced zip stitches, I felt I knew enough to wing my own attempt. It's not perfect as I shouldn't have gone all the way to the edges, but it is in and it works!!! Job done.

So are you ready for the ta-daah?

Here it is!!!

TA-DAAAH!!

The very conservative, almost boring practical front, followed by the gorgeous, textured lovely back!

 And of course, should I ever visit my friend and sit on her sofa, I can always take my co-ordinating quilt with me.

Maybe I should cut up some more jeans and make some more cushions, I rather like this one.

As if to congratulate me on finishing a job, a beautiful, very pinky rainbow appeared. Lovely.