I’m sorry for the prolonged absence. With a deployed spouse and going back to school, finding the time for blogging has been hard. I wanted to share that my quilt, Hypnotic Eye will be on the cover of Issue 20 of Modern Quilts Unlimited!
I hope everyone is having an amazing summer! I am splitting my time between my family, long arm quilting and working on the last few Master’s classes I have before I student teach in January!
My local chapter of the Modern Quilt Guild had its monthly meeting last Wednesday. We also had our first swap of the year. We did modern pot holders. The goal was to use modern fabrics, color combinations and/or modern pattern to create a pot holder. It needed to be something that you, yourself, would want to receive. This is what I created:
It is the Circle of Geese block by Piece By Number.
I actually downsized the pattern to finish around 8.5″ square. I used a layer of InsulBrite batting and a layer of 100% cotton batting – as stated in the directions for the InsulBrite. I didn’t got crazy with the quilting, because the two layers of batting made it pretty thick. I also didn’t bother attempting to traditionally bind this. It is so tiny, it made more sense to me to just flip the backing over to the front. I have a great tutorial here on how to do that.
I got a fun Valentine’s inspired pot holder in return, I would love to show you a picture but being pink and covered in hearts, Anne has long since absconded with it!
Have a Happy Tuesday!
PS. I get my floors tomorrow! Say a prayer that they match and this month long saga can finally be over!
Have you missed me? I spent all of last week fighting some mysterious stomach bug. It was pretty awful. The only bright side is that Anne was spared the sickness, thank goodness! Can’t imagine taking care of her and me with us both sick. She is such a big help.
I did finish my October A Lovely Year of Finishes project, but that will have to wait a few days, unless of course you are on Instagram or Facebook and saw the pictures online already. Yesterday I was feeling pretty good, I even took Anne to Boo at the Zoo with some friends and while she was napping I worked on my bee blocks for Do Good Stitches. I only finished one, but seeing as I had to design my own paper pieced templates, I’m ok with that! The theme this month is boy themed blocks with blues, greens and browns. I think my second block will be trees and after seeing my first one, I think you will understand why…
So the question for you is…want to go camping?
Welcome to the 3rd tutorial for the Sew Intertwined QAL! Warning – there is paper piecing and some planning involved – this is not for the feint of heart but I promise to make it as easy for you as humanly possible! I will pass on all of my tips and tricks! If you are not up for paper piecing – Jenna has a traditionally pieced tutorial for the same block over at Sew Happy Geek – head on over and check it out!
Now for the planning stage! Take your print out from when you were planning your quilt and label the woven blocks as follows – trust me, this will really help you and is a very important step!
Next, print out your Sew Intertwined Paper Piecing Templates. You will need to print the file a total of 12 times – which is 48 pieces of paper. Please don’t hate me for having you print so much, I promise you will be tickled with how amazingly easy your blocks will line up when you are ready to piece your top! As far as the printing goes you will probably need to play with the print size – I had to go to 104% to get mine to print to the right size when printing from the PDF. The longest solid line should measure 8 and 3/8 inches.
Now I want you to label each of the 48 pages. Use your template (see first image) of your quilt and write in each of your colors and the block number. It is important to remember that the templates are mirror images of the blocks. If you are extremely well organized in the first two steps the rest of it will truly be a breeze. One thing to note (this will make labeling easier, I swear) you are making 3 blocks a total of 4 times, at least you are if you did your layout similar to mine. If you look closely at my diagram you will notice that blocks 1, 4, 7, and 10 are all the same, just turned a 1/4 turn each time. The same is true of [2, 5, 8, 11] and [3, 6, 9, 12].
Ok, now that you all hate me and are ready to walk away, here is my example:
Now I am going to ask you to print one more of the templates – this time just print one page as the templates are all exactly the same, they just help with the labeling. I want you to cut it apart, use your rotary cutter, you will have to cut a lot of paper with it anyways, may as well start now. Cut each section on the line, for the sections that have the seam allowance leave it there, it will make your life easier.
Now cut your fabrics: I am going to tell you the cutting for my colors, the widths and lengths will be the same for everybody you just need to supplement your colors in.
Background Fabric (white): 1 strip measuring 2 7/8″ by width of fabric – this is for the center square. Sub-cut these into 12 squares measuring 2 7/8″ x 2 7/8″
Background Fabric (white): 7 strips measuring 3 1/8″ by width of fabric. You will also need 12 squares measuring 3″ each – I will show you how to sub-cut these later.
Green Fabric: 2 strips measuring 2.5″
Orange Fabric: 2 strips measuring 2.5″
Pink Fabric: 2 strips measuring 2.5″
Gray Fabric: 3 strips measuring 2.5″
Leaf Fabric: 3 strips measuring 2.5″
Let’s start by sub-cutting the 3″ white squares:
For the rest of the cutting, take the template pieces you cut apart, you will lay them on top of your fabric to cut them out. Remember if working with prints you will want to lay the templates on the fabric with the fabric right side up and the template right side down. For the templates that have seam allowance on them cut those sides 1/8″ larger than the seam allowance, for the sides with no seam allowance cut them 3/8″ larger than the template. This will ensure that you have enough fabric with very little waste. (this is my first tip! It works with every paper piecing project you will ever do!)
Now on to the bigger background section of the paper pieced templates (piece 1). Using the 7 strips measuring 3 1/8″:
For all the rest of the strips you will have 2 different sized pieces depending on whether you are cutting piece 2 or piece 4. Lay your template face down with the fabric face up and cut as described above.
Once you have cut all your pieces, the hard part is over. I suggest moving your templates and all your cut pieces right next to your sewing machine, if you have the room. Lay out the fabric by color and by cut. Have you templates handy and you are ready to start!
(this is my next tip – it will help prevent any shifting!) With printout facing down glue your first piece to the template. Make sure you are covering all of piece 1 on the template.
Press Open
The goal is to make sure that your template will be completely covered each time you press open your fabric. Press Open
Sew and Press Open.
Lather, Rinse, Repeat 47 more times! (ok, can you tell I’ve been sick for a week, I’m getting a little punchy!).
When you have them all sewn, you can trim them up. There is no point trimming them as you sew them, it will just take you more time.
This is just like when we were all in school, use your rotary cutter (ok, that part isn’t like school) and your ruler and cut along the dotted lines! I’m going to repeat that last step…CUT ALONG THE DOTTED LINES. If you cut on the solid ones you are going to be rather upset with yourself.
Ok, it is time to get all that pent up aggression out, I’m sure by now you are super frustrated with me. Tear off all the paper from the templates. Be careful not to pull out your stitches!
Do you all hate me yet? Well, get ready for it, here come the Y-Seams. I swear if you follow my directions and review each picture carefully they will not be so bad! From here on out all seams are 1/4″.
Taking one of your 2 7/8″ background squares, place it on top of piece A like the picture below:
(this is the final piece – Piece D)
Rinse. Lather. Repeat. 11 more times. I swear this is totally worth it, check out how perfectly my points match up!
If you have any questions at ALL leave them here or in the Flickr Group and I will be around to answer them, but have mercy on me if I am not quick this weekend, I take my 2nd dose of my new medication tonight and it is bound to make me feel crappy all weekend. Feel free to print this tutorial as PDF too: Woven Block Tutorial.
This post is sponsored by Contemporary Cloth who provided the beautiful fabrics for my quilt.
© Copyright M. Dunworth 2012. You are welcome to use this tutorial for your personal use. Please do not use this tutorial, my words or my pictures without my permission. You are welcome to link to this tutorial, but please do not take my work.
This is block is called Star & Dot and is attributed to “Comfort” from the year 1910.
You will want to download the cutting templates and the paper piecing templates.
(Please let me know if you have any trouble downloading these files – I would be happy to email them to you as well.)
You will need:
Helpful Supplies Include:
I like to start by lowering my stitch length; this makes it easier to tear off the paper when you are done with your piecing. I lower mine down to 1.6.
Using your cutting templates, with the fabric right side up, cut the following (I like to cut mine slightly larger (about 1/8”) than the templates – gives you a little wiggle room):
White – 16 pieces with A2
Black – 16 pieces with B2
Black Medium Diamond – 8 pieces with A1
Black Medallion – 8 pieces with A1
Blue Medium Diamond – 8 pieces with B1
Blue Floral Medium – 8 pieces with B1
Starting with the B Sections follow the picture tutorial:
If you have a clear plastic sewing table – like the one that came standard with my machine, I recommend putting a light underneath it – this will help you arrange your pieces to be perfectly in line with your paper piecing template.
As you can see in the picture below, the bright light from underneath will help you align your pieces and it allows you to not only sew at night when you can’t look out your window for natural light, it also saves fabric – you can more precisely line things up and won’t have to use big pieces.
You are now ready to sew!
NOTE: It is important that you sew each piece in the order, I’ve listed – this will help you match up your seams when you piece your sections together!
Make all 16 of the paper pieces. Then bust out your iron and press the sections down.
Cut your sections apart along the outer dotted lines.
Remove your paper backing – if you are using the Carol Doak’s Foundation Papers, they will virtually fall off! Don’t worry, with a small enough stitch length regular printer paper will come off fairly easily too.
Next, pull out your diagram and match up your sections, place them in two piles – white pile and black pile.
Remember how I had you sew your sections together in a VERY specific way…this is because it will make joining your sections super easy. Your seams will lock together.
I love chain piecing, I think I have said that about 10 other times on this blog, and here again I am employing it. If you don’t already chain piece, I would highly recommend it! Saves lots of time!
You will have sixteen 6 inch blocks, I press mine open and trim the dog ears.
Next layout your blocks and sew your stars together.
NOTE: When sewing your squares into blocks – it is more important that seams match up rather than the squares fit perfectly together. The seams matching up (interlocking together) is what will give you the perfect star points!
Time to quilt! I used black thread to quilt mine so it would blend in nicely. White would have stood out beautifully and made a great statement, but I wanted the quilting to blend.
You will need three strips for the binding in a solid blue. Feel free to follow my binding tutorial.
Bind and voila!
If you are not a fan of this particular design, here are a few other options, all made with the same paper pieced template and the same number of segments.
Enjoy! And if you end up making anything from one of my tutorials I would love to see it!
Make sure you enter to win the Fat Quarter Shop giveaway that I am hosting – you could win a Fat Quarter Bundle of Avalon AND a set of Carol Doak’s Foundation Papers.
