Scraps of Memories

I finally finished the quilted pillowcase I started a couple weeks ago.  I had a throw pillow in the living room that I'd found at an antique store years ago; it was pretty scratchy and uninviting and always ended up on the chair in which people rarely sit.  So I decided to have some fun making a new case for it.  I had an interesting scrap of fabric I found in my grandma's attic years ago.  It was sew onto a pink moppy piece of fabric and looked like a drawstring purse.  I ditched the moppy material and kept the other piece, with gray and red roses, thinking I'd use it sometime in a small project.  The day finally arrived.  I made that piece of fabric the centerpiece of my crazy quilt top and added other memorable scraps I'd saved: disassembled pieces of my grandpa's old silk tie, trimmings from a tie-dyed apron I made for my nephew, parts of a vintage pillowcase, some embroidery linen with an interesting print (which I ended up embroidering on the new pillow), some strips of a red sheet, and bits of calico my mom gave me.  As I randomly sewed the pieces together--not planning the width or orientation of the strips--it became an "anything goes" quilt as I crafted without regard to colors, patterns, textures, and sizes.  It was like I had a blank canvas and I just made it up as I went along.  The new pillowcase fits nicely on this now comfy, squooshy throw pillow.  It goes well with my favorite red leather armchair, a relic that belonged to the doctor who started my dad's business in the early 20th century; there's still a burn from on of his fancy cigars on the underside of the cushion.