Thoughtful Sunday #11

Star Christmas Tree Topper

Our Christmas tree has been without a real tree topper for several years. We always say we will get one but somehow never have the time or just don't see anything that we like. This year I was determined to have something on the top of the tree.

I decided to go for a simple star since we had an old topper that could serve as the base. I had all these small pieces of gold from an old fabric sample folder. Some are metallic; some are not. They looked like a good possibility for a scrappy, strip pieced star.

Each sample was about 6 inches square. I cut them into 1 1/2 inch strips and made three strip sets, which were then sewn together so the fabrics lined up into one long strip. The paper template was to see if the strip set was wide enough.

Here is the star that determined the template. It is a tree topper itself and is made of a dark metal. Its holder is too short and wide to actually stay in place on the top of a tree and since the star is hollow, the whole thing gets lost. A piece of PVC pipe was hot glued to the base to make it more sturdy.

It sits on the top nice enough now. It just needs to be dressed up a bit.

There were several forms of fusible interfacing used in this project, mostly because they are all stored in the same bin together. As soon as I found one that I thought would work, I'd give it a try. I know there is Steam A Seam 2 and Decor Bond in this project. They make it so easy to finish a project fast. The only sewing is the strip set that forms the star. Here the star is traced and ready to cut.

Now things are looking better. Once the gold star was cut out it was a little bit too small and needed something to make it stand out. Placing it on a black background made it look a lot better. I even fused the fabric to the PVC pipe. That was some tricky pressing. See those white interfacing edges showing? A touch of black Sharpie around the edges took care of that. It sort of looks like a magic wand laying on the table.

Each star was hot glued to the original metal star. I can't say this will be a forever tree topper but it looks better than no tree topper at all.

While I was making the star, this tree topper appeared. It would have been fine with me if this one stayed, even though it might have startled me in the middle of the night.

Here it is when it first went on the tree. I decided the star was just a little far from the rest of the tree so we gave it a little trim.

I like this proportion much better. This year, our little tree has lights, ornaments, AND a star on top. I love sitting by the tree in the quiet of the morning. There are lots of stories in those ornaments.

Machine Quilted Text: A Finished Mini Quilt

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I was really excited to try out adding text to my quilt by way of Creative Quilting with Your Walking Foot. Adding text to your quilt is one of the last things Jacquie teaches in her class.

I decided to test my skill with a mini quilt. Naturally, I chose the word "create". I chose a simple font (Jacquie says a simple font is important for this technique) from my word processing software and increased the font size. I printed it on card stock so that it would be easier to work with and hold up long enough for me to complete marking the letters on my quilt top.

I applied a little bit of glue stick to the back of each letter to keep it still while I was marking around it. I used a blue water soluble pen to trace around each letter.

Then I started matchstick quilting around each letter. The blue tape is a registration line so that my quilting lines don't start leaning to the left or right. I always have a straight line point of reference.

And here are the first three letters all quilted and pretty. Then I saw the word "ate" and had to stop and get a snack. Ha.

All finished!! Let's go over the size of this project. The blue background was cut 8 1/2 inches x 14 1/2 inches. The border is 4 inch strips. The top and bottom are 4 inches x 14 1/2 inches. The side strips are 4 inches x 15 1/2 inches. After quilting and squaring up, this project finishes at 21 inches x 15 inches. The letters are 2 inches tall.

Here's how it looks from the back. For the border, I simply followed the grid design on the fabric.

If I had it to do all over again, there are a few things I would do differently.

• Use bigger letters! These letters are two inches tall. That is tiny when it comes to quilting around them. I am happy with the result but it was tricky quilting inside the "e" and "a".
• I would practice starts and stops. I used the technique of setting my stitch length to zero, stitching a few stitches, then setting it to the quilting stitch length. While this worked, there are spots that look a little knotty. 
• I wanted a thread that contrasted with the background, and this one does, but I think I will try a darker than background thread next time. That is more of a personal preference.

This mini quilt will hang right beside my sewing machine to remind me to always be creative. I have really enjoyed the Creative Quilting with Your Walking Foot class and know the techniques I learned there will show up over and over again in my quilting. If you are looking for a machine quilting class, you should consider this one.

Linking up with Scraptastic Tuesday at She Can Quilt, Fabric Tuesday at Quilt Story, and Work in Progress Wednesday at Freshly Pieced. Also linking up to Whoop Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.

December Believe Circle Blocks

Laura is our quilter for December. These blocks were fast and fun to make.

I think I spent more time choosing the fabrics that actually stitching the blocks.

They are made from a tutorial on Pat Sloan's blog. Pat loves helping us bust through our stash. She calls it a Scrap Happy Shoo Fly Block.

Laura asked us to use bright colors along with white on black and black on white (or low volume).

I love the anticipation of waiting each month to see what blocks we will make and then after sending them in wondering what the final quilt will look like. And knowing that each quilt we make will go to a special child in need at My Very Own Blanket. So thankful for do. Good Stitches and the Believe Circle.

Linking up with Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times and Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt.

Thoughtful Sunday #10

Memory Quilt Finish: Two Beautiful Quilts

Two more finished memory quilts to go with one I finished a few weeks ago. They are very similar. Only the blocks are different. The quilting and binding are the same.

Each quilt contains eighteen shirts. The background fabric is Moda's Bella solid in Porcelain.
The large squares are cut 9 1/2 inches. The blocks with the smaller squares have a 3 1/2 inch center square of shirt fabric. A 3 1/2 inch square of background fabric is sewn to each side, then a 3 1/2 inch x 9 1/2 inch rectangle of background fabric is sewn to the top and bottom. It is a super fast and super easy block to make and I love the contrast of small and large squares.

Each one has a label sewn on the back.

The backing of this quilt is a solid green. For quilting, I stitched a quarter inch away from each side of the seams connecting the blocks and then I stitched a cross hatch of diagonal lines through all the blocks.

The binding for each quilt is scrappy shirt fabric.

This quilt finishes at 58 inches square. It has already been washed, giving it that old fashioned crinkly cozy quilt feeling.

Here is the other quilt. It is made by cutting four 5-inch squares from each shirt. The squares are combined into a four patch block. The sashing between each block is cut 1 1/2 inches wide. The outside border is cut at 2 1/2 inches wide. This quilt finishes at 63 inches square.

There are two lines of quilting one each row of sashing and the four patch blocks are cross hatched on the diagonal. All of the stitching lines run into the border so no additional quilting was needed in the border.

Here is the label on this quilt.

The backing on this quilt is made from two colors, a green and a brown. That brown is tricky. Sometimes it looks blue and other times, like in this picture, it looks purpleish. I'm sticking with brown.

Here is a closer look at the quilting.

The plaids make both of these quilts look warm and cozy... and they are just that.

I'll be delivering these quilts to their owner in the next week or so. They were a pleasure to make and I hope they bring many warm memories to all that snuggle under them.

Linking up with Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.

Nerdy Star Wars Pillowcases

Let's pause for a moment and reflect on the nerdy awesomeness of these pillowcases. My boys are all crazy Star Wars fans and with the new movie coming out this month, I had to join in with these pillowcases that they will just LOVE!

This one will go to one of the teens. I matchstick quilted on the light colored trim with glow in the dark thread. There are seven rows of stitching. I've had the thread a while. It is a 30 weight polyester thread by Superior Threads. I have not tested its glowing qualities yet.

This one will go to the other teen. It is an inverse of the first one.

This one will go to my Navy son. For the moment, he is living on the ship and is limited in what he can do to personalize his space. I think he'll like this special touch.

There are some really great pillowcase making tutorials out there. This time, I used this burrito pilllowcase tutorial over at Made by ChrissieD. Her instructions are clear and easy to follow. It has been a while since I made a pillowcase and needed a review. The timing of her tutorial was just perfect.

It was really hard not to post this on Instagram. My kids never read my blog but they do follow my Instagram feed. It's also hard not to go ahead and give these to them, but they are Christmas gifts so I will hide them away and hope to goodness that I remember where they are when the time comes!

Happy gift sewing!

Linking up with Work in Progress Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced and Let's Bee Social at Sew Fresh Quilts.