I was saving my second new smocking idea to write about in this post, and it’s  funny, because in response to my last post,  Julie wrote and suggested that I might want to try smocking throw pillows. She had seen some in magazines and thought they looked good. Thank-you,  Julie!  I very much agree with you that smocking looks great on throw pillows. That was the other idea that I had been saving to write about in this post. We seem to think alike! I too have seen a few pictures of smocked throw pillows. In the pictures that I saw, the pillows were machine smocked. They really looked very nice and very unusual.

The pillows that I hope to make will differ some from the ones that I saw in the pictures. I will hand-smock them; probably on an insert that will be sewn into the front of the pillow, or perhaps I’ll smock the entire pillow front. With hand-smocking I have the freedom to compose my own designs and make them as elaborate as I choose. While the things that are machine smocked look very nice, the designs are usually basic and common. (That’s not to say that hand-smocking doesn’t use basic or common designs; they often do.) Then I will hand-embroider something like the scenes that I embroider on dresses. I’m thinking that it could be a throw pillow to decorate a child’s room; perhaps a pillow to sit in a rocking chair.

I think smocked throw pillows would also look great on a couch or daybed. If they were to be used in a room other than a child’s room I would do an elaborate smocked design and perhaps even embroider flowers or something very general on some of them. Anyway, I’m very eager to try these new projects. I have a couple of dress orders right now, but hopefully when I get them finished, I’ll be able to try one or both of these ideas. When I complete either the wall hanging or the pillow I’ll definitely post photos. I only wish this work weren’t so time consuming and that I could work on more than one thing at the same time- (four, why not six, hands would be nice!)  It’s difficult to have the patience to complete one thing before thinking about the next~