My LEARNING PILLOW

This pillow top was made soon after I began to learn about crazy quilt style of embellishing and stitching.  I pieced the top of light colored silky fabrics and began to stitch with several books at my side!  I guess I did a little encrusting of the seams even back then but I was only trying to make different stitches and keep them straight along each other!   I decided to put everything DIFFERENT on my 'learning pillow' that I had not used before.  Thus you will see many things.   There are motifs of crochet and tatting as well as ruched ribbons and silk ribbon embroidery flowers etc.  The pink crocheted basket is filled with flowers made of silk organdy ribbons.  When I thought I was finished I took it to my local needlework shop for her inspection.  She said, it looks nice SO FAR, but I don't see any beads!    I hadn't even thought of beads.  So back I went and got out all my beads.   I sewed them on to every motif and seam and literally filled in the background as much as I could.  I had a green satin pillow - plain on both sides.  So I just 'appliqued' this pillow top onto that existing pillow.  I stitched it in such a way that I turned under the edges and stitched by hand to hide my stitches right in the seam of the cording around the pillow.   When I took it back, several ladies thought I had made the pillow also with the cording around the edge.   My teacher looked and knew what I had done, and just smiled!!!!!  Bless her.