Don't Cry Over Spilled...

Can you guess what this is?

It is thread...but be more specific.
How about now???

Those of you who know my family personally are probably thinking that this looks like the deviously crafty work of little A & Z!

And you would be correct.

This WAS my bobbin case with all of my ready to use wound bobbins in a beautiful rainbow of colors.

Now it is my randomly knotted collection of unwound bobbins!
Don't let these super squishy, luv-bug adorable faces fool you for a minute...

these boys know how to make trouble...

 with a capital "T".

Most of their trouble is on a larger scale...
this happened to be a very small mess, but a very tangley one indeed.

So, what do you do with a bobbin case that has been ransacked by your local band of marauding pirateers?
Hmmm...
the options:
1. Throw the whole thing in the trash.
notes: very wasteful, expense to replace
2. Untangle and rewind bobbins
notes: really?  NO, not really.
3. Cut losses by cutting off tangled threads and check a different type of thread to make sure your IUD is still firmly in place
notes: reasonable plan
4. Turn lemons into lemonade and make something with those seemingly wasted threads...
notes: does anyone sense a pillow tutorial coming on???
Here it is, the "Don't Cry Over Spilled Thread" Pillow

As I was staring at those twisted, intertwined threads, it occurred to me, they are pretty cool to look at...what if I took the whole mess and stitched it onto fabric?
So, I cut the ends of the threads that were still attached to the bobbins, and played with the strings a bit, kind of spreading them out.  Then I cut a square of fabric and plopped the mess onto it.

I played a little more, swirling colors and moving threads until I had an interesting looking array.

Then I stitched in a grid pattern over the entire square in a thread color that closely matches the fabric.  I kept the grid lines close together to ensure that the threads were held securely.

Then I took the square and used it as the front panel of a pillow cover (you can find my simple pillow cover tutorial here).

The result is an interesting looking pillow with a tangled mess of a history.

Linked up at...
feathered nest, bacon time with the hungry hungry hypo, happy go lucky, becoming martha, whipperberry, it's overflowing, i heart nap time, it's so very cheri, keeping it simple, homemaker on a dime, uncommon designs, creatively living, craft-o-maniac, skip to my lou, salt tree, love grows wild,
nap-time creations, sew much ado, someday crafts, girl inspired