Try a Tool with Studio 180 Design ~ The Snowflake Quilt

 Snowflake is my August Island Batik Ambassador project.

Disclaimer:  The materials used to make this quilt were given to me by Island Batik and industry partners.

 This month's challenge is Try a Tool.  Each one of the ambassadors received a Studio 180 Ruler as the new "tool".  The guidelines were to make a quilt using at least 16 of the units with the new ruler.

 I received the Corner Pop ruler.  This ruler helps you to make blocks with pieced corners with very little wasted fabric.  You can sew blocks in 22 different sizes with this ruler.  There's a helpful video demonstration available, too.  You can view the video here:  Corner Pop Ruler Video

 I used the Prairie Skies collection by Kathy Engle for my project, plus a large cut of Island Batik solid white fabric.

 The instructions for the ruler show you how to cut the corners the correct size for your block.  Then, instead of sewing on a corner square and cutting away the extra triangle as waste, the square is cut in half and used to make two corner triangles with very little waste.  The chart showed me I needed to cut 4-1/4" squares for my blocks.  I cut 4-1/2" squares instead, so I could use my Accuquilt Go to cut them out super fast.

 As you can see, even cutting the squares 1/4" larger than called for, there was very little waste to trim off.  Using the Corner Pop ruler is a two step process.  First you use one set of markings to cut away the background corner.  Then you use the other set of markings (as shown) to trim up the newly sewn corner.

 I made 8 three corner blocks and 8 four corner (snowball type) blocks for the Snowflake quilt.

 This is one of the four corner blocks, more commonly known as a Snowball block.

I tried Hobbs Heirloom Fusible Cotton Batting for this project.  It was easy to press the quilt sandwich together, and the fusible part of the batting is quite forgiving.  If you make a mistake and press in a wrinkle, you can simply re-separate the fabric from the batting, smooth it out, and re-press.

 I quilted in diagonal straight lines out from the center with white Aurifil thread and Schmetz needles.  It was easy to quilt this small size project on my Janome Memory Craft sewing machine.

 Lovely folds on my front porch rocking chair.

 I chose to use Island Batik solid gray fabric for the backing.  It blends nicely with the cool blue and snow white on the quilt top.

I used this blue Aurifil thread for the piecing and to sew on the binding.  

 I used two fabrics from the Prairie Skies collection to make the binding.

 Fun folds.

The Snowflake Quilt

Quilt Stats:

Finished Quilt Size:  37" x 37"

Finished Block Size:  8" x 8"

Fabric:  Prairie Skies by Kathy Engle for Island Batik

Batting:  Hobbs Fusible Cotton

Thread:  Aurifil

Ruler:  Corner Pop by Studio 180

Be sure to visit the other Island Batik Ambassadors to see what they're making here:

Carolina Asmussen ~Carolina Asmussen

Megan Best ~ Best Quilter

PamelaBoatright ~ PamelaQuilts

JenniferFulton ~ Inquiring Quilter

Vasudha Govindan ~ Storied Quilts

Joanne Hart ~ Unicorn Harts

Mania Hatziioannidi~ Mania for Quilts

CarlaHenton ~ Create in the Sticks

ConnieKauffman ~ Kauffman Designs

EmilyLeachman ~ The Darling Dogwood

DeniseLooney ~For the Love of Geese

LeahMalasky~Quilted Delights

SallyManke ~Sally Manke

Maryellen McAuliffe ~Mary Mack's Blog

Kathleen McCormick~Kathleen McMusing

CarolMoellers ~Carol Moellers Designs

Gail Renna ~ Quilt Haven Threads

Sharon Riley ~ Sew Riley Designs

MichelleRoberts ~Creative Blonde

Gail Sheppard ~Quilting Gail

Jennifer Strauser~Dizzy Quilter

JenniferThomas ~Curlicue Creations

AlisonVermilya ~Little Bunny Quilts

SandraWalker ~mmm! quilts

SuzyWebster ~Adventerous Applique and Quilting

JanetYamamoto ~Whispers of Yore

Be creative ~ Sew something beautiful today.

Jennifer Thomas

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Mill House Spring Quilting In Progress

 On my Juki today is the Mill House Spring quilt.  Before quilting begins, I always clean and oil my machine and put on a new needle.

 When I loaded this quilt onto the frame I was thinking,  "I'll just do a quick all over design and finish it in an afternoon."

 Ha! Ha! Ha!  That didn't happen.  I changed my mind and tried this new swirly onion quilting in the green outer border.  I like it.

 I accented it with small back and forth lines in the gold border.

 Here the borders are side by side.

 The hourglass blocks in the quilt center came out a little more puckered than I would like.  To disguise the imperfect blocks, I'm doing some heavy quilting.

 The pink triangles are getting quilted with vertical or horizontal lines, depending on their orientation.

 The white triangles are getting quilted with small pebbles.

 I've quilted three or four rows in so far, and it's looking pretty good!  

The pattern for the Mill House Spring quilt is available in my Etsy shop, here:  Mill House Spring Quilt Pattern.  If you sew one, please share a pic.  I would love to see your version.

Be creative ~ Sew something beautiful today.

Jennifer Thomas

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Binding the Happy Scrappy Quilt

 It's time to bind the Happy Scrappy quilt.  First I trimmed the backing and batting even with the quilt top.  

 I like to match my binding fabric to my outer border fabric, but in this case, the outer border was made up of a lot of brightly and different colored triangles.  I didn't want the binding to be quite that noisy.  This quilt needed something calming to hold it all together.  I chose to use two different blues for the binding strips.  Here I am sewing them all together to make one long strip.

 Trimming the triangles off.

 My binding, pressed and ready to sew to the quilt top.

 Pinning the binding to the quilt top.

Machine stitching the binding to the quilt.  I like to machine stitch the binding to the top, then fold it around to the back and hand stitch.  I enjoy hand stitching and usually do this on my front porch, or while watching television.  This quilt is almost finished.  Check back soon for the big reveal.

Be creative ~ Sew something beautiful today.

Jennifer Thomas

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The Never Ending Christmas Quilt ~ Progress

 I've been working on this Christmas Block of the Month quilt periodically for years.  It's safe to say it's not going to be finished for Christmas 2020.  But, I did cut out and prep a few more blocks this week.  It's been so long I had to go looking for the fabric, because I did not keep it in the box with the project.  What was I thinking?  I found it quickly, then decided not to use it anyway.  I had a nice stack of coordinating Laura Heine prints that matched well, and I was inspired to cut into them.

 Many of the block kits I cut out were fusible applique.  Sunrise was eager to help.

 Fused pieces for a Christmas bells and Holly block.

 I cut out the pieces for the Pieced Pine Tree Block.

Here's a few more tiny pieces for another fusible applique block.  I only have a few more blocks to cut and prep, and about half of the blocks are already sewn.  What a work in progress (WIP)!  What's your longest work in progress?  Do you think you will ever finish?  Leave me a comment below.

Be creative ~ Sew something beautiful today.

Jennifer Thomas

Click here to visit the Curlicue Creations shop.

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This is an affiliate link.  Clicking the link will not affect the purchase price.  However, if you do make a purchase, I may receive a commission.  Thank you.