Sometimes I'm a doofus.

I planned on making something awesome for my dad's birthday.

And then, you see, Christmas just happens to fall right before his birthday.

So last week I started in on getting a quilt for him made.

I figured I could get it good and started and if necessary, finish it after his birthday.

But my mom didn't think he'd use a quilt. And she suggested I make him a heating pad cover.

No problem, much more attainable.....

Daddy has worked on hot air balloon crews many times over the last 10 years, and it's something he really enjoys. And I had a small hot air balloon that I thought I could use.

And then I tried to get fancy... I thought I'd take my blue scraps, and create a patchwork sky out of them. And then applique the hot air balloon on top.

But when I did that, it looked like the hot air balloon was about to crash into a giant blue brick wall. All I need is to quilt in some worried passengers to complete the look!

So I trashed that idea. Like I said, sometimes I'm a doofus.

So then I decided to just use some lovely blue solid I had in my stash.

{Two thoughts here: why didn't this idea occur to me in the first place, and why do I have an obnoxious amount of fabric in my stash?? Yikes!}

So I created a hot air balloon out of some scraps.

I didn't have any Wonder Under to fuse it on, but I had some basting spray. Turns out it worked almost as well, and it didn't add that pesky layer of bulk. Good to know, right?

So I satin stitched around the parts of the balloon, then I added some clouds with my free-motion foot. Turns out that quilting clouds is really fun!

And I decided to use the blue brick wall as the back -- fortunately I didn't attach the hot air balloon to it. I'll post pictures when it's all assembled and finished!