Saturday, July 23, 2011

The Painted Turtle

My neighborhood group of the American Sewing Guild met this week and made turtle pillows to be donated to The Painted Turtle Camp, a camp for children with life-threatening and chronic illnesses. The camp is sponsored by Paul Newman as part of his Hole in the Wall Gang Camps. This is the 2011 National Community Service Project for ASG.

The pattern is provided by ASG for members. The turtles will be stuffed when they arrive at the camp and given to the children who attend the camp.  
Painted Turtle camp

The eyes were digitized by  LindeeGEmbroidery, downloaded, and machine embroidered on the turtles.
American Sewing Guild community service

Since there is a shortage of pillows in colors suitable for boys, we chose colors with that in mind. This is a picture of our turtles ready to be shipped to The Painted Turtle Camp.
American Sewing Guild community service


A label template was provided by ASG  to iron on the back of the turtle. After checking the prices of printable fabric sheets, I decided to experiment with printing my own fabric. I cut a piece of  Wonder-Under Fusible Web to 8 1/2 by 11 inches. I fused this to white cotton fabric which was about the weight of Kona Cotton. I trimmed the fabric the size of the Wonder Under. So now I have an 8 1/2 by 11 inch sheet of printable fabric. It ran very smoothly through my printer. (Don't tell my husband!) I cut out the labels and ironed them to the back of the turtles.
American Sewing Guild Painted Turtle Camp


6 comments:

  1. Your turtle photography is great! But is it my imagination or are those blue turtles slightly unfinished? haha

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  2. Well, yes, the blue "turtle tops" had to make a quick stop at your house before being shipped to the campers!

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  3. HELLO!

    I am a Painted Turtle counselor and have been for 5 years! I stumbled across your blog while looking for photos from the PT for a camp related project. GREAT TURTLES!!! I cant even begin to explain how much our campers LOVE LOVE LOVE the turtles!!!! Keep up the great work!!!

    ps. ever thought of stitching little turtle toes?! :P

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  4. Thank you for letting us know that the turtles are appreciated by the campers! They are such a fun project to make. Great idea about the turtle toes!

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  5. How do I get the pattern? My daughters sorority is a huge supporter of the Painted Turtle Camp I would love to make some turtles for the camp and send them, I checked the site but didnt see any pattern just instructions. Please help so I can make some to send. Thanks, Tammy

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    1. I found this link to the pattern:
      http://asg.org/members/member_files/2011_Painted_Turtle_Pattern.pdf

      Link to instructions:
      http://www.asg.org/files/community_service/The_Painted_Turtle_Pillow_online_pres.pdf

      Link to updated instructions:
      http://www.phoenixasg.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Simple-Turtle-Pillow.pdf

      For my second batch of pillows, I used the updated instructions. I had to adjust the pattern a bit, but I liked the way the pillows went together much better.

      Good Luck!

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