Teacher Appreciation

If you read my last post, you know I had in mind to make this for teacher appreciation:

My friend Mandy accuses me of making everything harder than it has to be, and I'm beginning to suspect she's right. I decided I wanted them in a circle, like a dresden wedge. Perfectly cute pattern as it is, and it's not like I just had a ton of time for this project, so I should have left well enough alone, but I didn't. I made 20 pencils, put strips of white down each edge & proceeded to try to make a dresden out of them. It wasn't pretty. There's a reason there is no picture of them included in this post.

But in explaining my project to Mandy, she had a much better idea & even sketched it out for me:

I wish I'd had a bit more time on this project, because there are parts I'm not quite happy with, but overall I think the design is absolutely adorable.

I stitched in the ditch and around the "pencils" with gray to make stand out more:

And then I did some organic outlining in white thread.

And finally, in honor of its designer, I bound it in pink polka dots.

 If you knew Mandy, you'd know nothing else would do. And if you knew me, you'd know that despite spending hours on this, I never once considered what I'd wrap it in. And in fact, forgot completely about it until after I had my daughter buckled in her booster seat.

So, a minimalist ribbon it is...

I hope she likes it. And I hope I get to do another one, more slowly and carefully next time.

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts for her Finish it Friday series.