Flag pillow

Labor Day will be here before you know it and since I love to decorate for all the holidays, I made a scrappy American flag pillow.

 When I was getting prepped for my collage class, I wanted to included a simple pillow pattern ...this gave me the perfect project to use as a sample.

But I prefer my pillows to have more body...to be quilted. So I took the class sample apart, quilted it then added a back zipper. This pic below is it before:

I added the off center zip then cut binding to finish off the pillow like a quilt.

The binding gives it a finished flange...

Check off another finish for August!

FREE BLOCK PATTERN:

If you would like to make this block

Cut: 

(8) 1-1/2" navy squares

       (8) 1-1/2" white squares
(2) 8-1/2"x1-1/2" white strips
(2) 8-1/2"x1-1/2" red strips
(2) 12-1/2"x1-1/2" white strips
(3) 12-1/2"x1-1/2" red strips
Sew the "stars" section first. Stitch the 16 patch by alternating 2 white and 2 navy squares to form a row. Make 4 rows then stitch the rows together alternating the color the row starts with.
Sew a short red strip to a short white strip. Repeat. Sew these two strips together, red to white. Attach this "striped" section to the 16 patch making sure that a navy square is in the upper left corner and that the top "stripe" is red.
Now sew a long red to a long white. Repeat. Stitch these two sections together, red to white, then sew the extra red to the bottom white. Attach this to the bottom of your stars and stripe section, red stripe on the top and bottom.


To complete the pillow, I added light blue fabric to all sides and trimmed the pillow front to 12-1/2" x 16-1/2"...quilt it with straight line quilting. Make a back piece with a zipper in it, the same size as the front. 
Put WRONG sides together...baste close to edge through all thicknesses. Bind it as you would a quilt. The binding becomes a cute flange...no turning inside out! 

Linking up with Oh Scrap.