Finish It Up Friday ~ Baby Quilt

Posted on September 24, 2021 by katyquilts

On, how I love making baby quilts! Can you see how our Two and Four QAL inspired this design?

This is the pantograph I used to quilt it.

I tried a different binding treatment on this one. I stitched the binding to the back, then do,see to the front and used this decorative stitch on my old Pfaff.

It takes a lot longer than regular top stitching. Here is the back.

Pretty cool, huh? I’ll be honest, I’m showing you the best parts of my stitching. It wasn’t this good and everywhere.

And here is the finish. It ended up 33 1/2 by 421/2 inches.

Have a great day!

Posted in Baby Quilts, Finishes 2021, Uncategorized | 6 Comments

Mini Cake Mints for Fat Quarter Shop

Posted on September 23, 2021 by katyquilts

Fat Quarter Shop recently released a free pattern and tutorial for Mini Cake Mints as part of their Short Cut Quilt Series. You can find the video tutorial here.

Their version can be made with one layer cake and four mini charm packs or one regular charm pack cut into quarters.

Because I wanted to make mine bigger and with a more controlled color scheme, I used one layer cake, one charm pack, a yard of blue and a yard of red. I could have used another half yard of the red as I ended up piecing the binding with something else. I did have quite a few leftover charm and layer cake squares. All my fabrics are from Lisa Bongean’s Gathering lines, mostly her newest line, American Gatherings.

Custom quilting takes a lot longer than pantographs, but I love how it looks on this quilt.

The backing came from my stash.

I tried to get a bit more creative with my photo styling.

I really enjoyed making this quilt and the piecing went very quickly. All top fabrics are from Fat Quarter Shop . Have a great day!

This post contains affiliate links.

Posted in Bed Quilts, Finishes 2021, Uncategorized | 4 Comments

Quick and Easy Baby Quilt ~ Part 2

Posted on September 22, 2021 by katyquilts

Time for part 2! If you missed it, click here for part 1 of this tutorial. For this part, I used my rectangle die shown below. Please note, dies in these sizes are available for the Accuquilt GO! And you can always use your rotary cutter and ruler to cut your pieces.

I cut up all the pink and aqua fabrics into rectangles. I sewed them together into four strips of 14 pieces, alternating pink and aqua.

Then I played a bit at the design wall. this was my original plan. The value of the pink and gray prints are too close together for my taste.

But what if I put the squares all in the center?

I like it, but I went back to this layout. I just tweaked it a bit by turning the gray and white strips around, varying the values.

Quick, easy, and cute. Time to get quilting!

Have a great day!

Posted in Baby Quilts, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Two and Four QAL

Posted on September 21, 2021 by katyquilts

Ready to play? This week, we will be sewing our blocks into rows. Perhaps, columns would be more accurate since these rows will run from top to bottom. This step took me about two hours total.

You will make five rows of four patches. Go ahead and play at the design wall, or just grab and sew! There should be 13 blocks in each row. Warning! Three of your rows should have dark squares in the upper left; the other two will have light squares in the upper left. You can see what I mean in the following photo.

Trust me, you will not be happy if you don’t t do this!

Now make 6 rows of fence rail blocks. Just alternate lights and darks, all 6 will be the same. Again, there will be 13 blocks in each row.

When sewing your rows, you can totally grab blocks at random to sew together. You can see that in many places, I have two or three identical blocks in a row. It’s just a look that I like. It will work either way.

The end is in sight. Keep going! Next week is an easy one! And head over to Wedding Dress Blue to check out Deanna’s progress!

Have a great day!

Posted in Two and Four QAL | 1 Comment

A Couple Things….

Posted on September 20, 2021 by katyquilts

I’m so excited! Lori is doing another one Humble Quilts QAL!

And remember those HSTs I set aside to take to AZ?

Looks like I have step one done already, with a few to spare!

Also, this deal is good until midnight tonight:

And I just found out that Connecting Threads has this deal going on:

Lastly, click here to register for this Accuquilt Live program so you don’t miss out on ideas, die giveaways, and fabric prizes! It will be Tuesday, September 21st at 1 PM Eastern Time.

I think that’s everything that I forgot to cover earlier. 🤣

Have a great day!

This post contains affiliate links.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Quick and Easy Baby Quilt ~ Part 1

Posted on September 20, 2021 by katyquilts

I picked up this little bundle for a whole dollar at Walmart a while back. I hardly ever buy fabric there, but, a dollar!

I challenged myself to come up with a plan for a baby quilt. I added fat quarters from these two fabrics from my stash.

I used these two dies.

I started by cutting three inch strips from two of the fat quarters and sewing them into pairs.

Then I used my 3 1/2 inch strip die to subcut them.

I’m often asked about fabric waste with die cutting. This is the waste I had from these two fat quarters.

The pieces at the bottom left are saved scraps, the strings above are all that went into the trash.

Next I sewed these into strips.

Come back Wednesday for part 2.

Have a great day!

Posted in Baby Quilts, Tutorials, Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Slow Stitching Sunday

Posted on September 19, 2021 by katyquilts

I finally started the quilting on this improv project. I started with machine quilting.

Here is the back. Not my smoothest work, it it isn’t done yet.

I’m going back and adding hand quilting with pearl cotton. It’s very relaxing hand work.

Have a great day!

Posted in Uncategorized | 6 Comments

This and That

Posted on September 18, 2021 by katyquilts

Winslow gives testimony to the snuggability of this quilt.

Willy likes it too, but he doesn’t burrow like she does.

I did some non quilty sewing this week. My favorite pj pants tore.

A big of fusible interfacing and a good zig zag left me feeling mighty thrifty!

Our raspberries have been very productive this year. They are yummy! Winslow loves them. Willy, not so much.

We have several hydrangea bushes on the side of our house. I forget they are there. So pretty!

Have a great day!

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Finish It Up Friday ~ The Christmas Quilt

Posted on September 17, 2021 by katyquilts

If this quilt doesn’t scream Christmas, I don’t know what does! my dear friend, Zenia, gave me this beautiful vintage top. I couldn’t wait to hand quilt it!

The material was quite thin and required a few repairs. It quilted up so nice! I used #5 pearl cotton in a sage green to quilt it.

I used Quilter’s Dream Cotton Request for batting. i was asked if I tested these fabrics for bleeding before I started working on it. I did not. Whether it bled or not, the cried out to be finished. I washed it when it was finished and it didn’t run at all.

It is every bit as soft and cozy as it looks.

I used plain, unbleached muslin one the back.

I came as close as I could to matching the red for the binding. It works well enough.

I love the back!

I so love finishing these old tops! A huge thanks to Zenia for her most generous gift.

Have a great weekend!

Posted in Bed Quilts, Finishes 2021, Hand quilting, Uncategorized, Vintage Quilts | 7 Comments

Dollhouse Chronicles ~ A Last Look

Posted on September 16, 2021 by katyquilts

Some of you that have been around a while, may remember my Dollhouse posts. If you are interested, click on the link in my sidebar to go back and look. Anyway, as part of our downsizing process, I sold my mid century modern ranch.

I took these photos before it was picked up. I loved creating this.

I built the kitchen and appliances from scratch, along with the table, and living room furniture.

I loved my egg carton fireplace!

And the hardwood floors.

I think my favorite things are the couch and chair I made.

I still have my big dollhouse. In fact, I’m taking it out to AZ with me! Daughter #2 has built a small dollhouse and I think we will have fun working on these and sharing ideas.

Hope you enjoyed this little look back. Good bye, little house!

Posted in Dollhouse, Uncategorized | 4 Comments