Christmas Mini Quilts

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It’s that time of year, so I dug out all the Christmas themes quilted items I’ve made through the years and hung up a few along one wall here in the shop.

I always get asked about patterns, and since I’ve made these over a long time even before I had a shop, I figured I should just make a list all in one place. Many of these are free downloads, or sell as a digital PDF. Please support the pattern authors! It’s worth the few bucks for them to figure out the math and steps for you.

This is the Christmas Baubles mini quilt, free pattern from the Moda Bake Shop, by Jen Daly. This is actually the second time I made this, having sold the first one. The fabric line is an older one from Sweetwater.

Super popular this year, the Mini Charming Christmas Tree pattern was free from Fat Quarter shop.

This is another one by Jen Daly, called Merry and Bright. You can buy the pattern on Etsy right here. Jen runs a quilt along every Christmas on her blog. It’s worth it to check in and download the free patterns as she releases them, since after the holidays she takes them down and sells the finished pattern in her shop.

From the book Mini Quilts by Cluck Cluck Sew, any quilt is Christmas if you use your Christmas fabrics.

This one was one I made up myself from scraps of another quilt. I had a few half square triangles and just played around and looked up some pics until I saw if you arrange four HSTs just so, they look like envelopes. Place them on point, throw in a background, border, and DONE! It’s about placemat size.

The large square wall quilt on the back wall is the Little Joys quilt, put on as quilt along by the Fat Quarter Shop a long time ago. The PDF is available for purchase here.

This runner was actually fun to do! I used the Mini Quick Curve ruler and a free pattern from Sew Kind of Wonderful called the Mini Mod Ornament. The pattern gives the cut pieces of fabric for requirements, but I made three blocks from 3 fat quarters. I cut all the pieces from each print and mixed them up in each block.

This runner was made by Snowy using a mini charm pack and a matching Kona solid. The triangles are folded and only the edge is sewn in. It was a pattern in Moda’s Candy Squares Quilt Pattern Project Booklet, currently out of print. Not sure what I did with my copy.

This is a great example of just taking a nice quilt block, adding a finishing border, then making it a wall hanging. Not sure what the block is called.

This was a quilt as you go runner, done wonky on purpose. I was just using up scraps in my Christmas bins and pulled all the metallic prints.

And lastly, the second most popular Christmas mini quilt I get asked about is this one! This is a PDF downloadable pattern from Cut Loose Press, called Crazy Christmas Trees. Buying the digital copy is your best bet here. The ruler is not required as ANY 45 degree ruler will work! Especially if you follow the directions. Not like me.

Some of the minis above are also table runners, placemats, or table toppers. I like to hang them up just for a change of pace! I’m sure this list will grow as I dig more out of storage and bring them to the shop. Remember, any pattern can be a Christmas one if you use holiday fabrics!

Yellow again! And Christmas hours

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We are back to being open for in store shopping and of course you may continue to do curbside pickup if you wish.

For the holidays, our last day of in store shopping will be Saturday December 19th. Our online shop will continue to be open until December 23rd.

We will be closed – including online – from December 24th through to January 4th.

During closing, we will be doing inventory and spiffing up the site a bit to make sure as many items show up for you to browse online.

Thanks for your understanding!

Christmas table topper and candy quilting

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Hiya!

I made a small project to help get me back in the swing of things. I was at my local quilt shop and spotted this super cute table topper pattern  called “Sticks and Stones” from This & That patterns. 

From my stash, I pulled out a charm pack of Jingle All the Way fabric that I had saved up. It’s hard to find now.

Table topper pieced. Okay so it's Christmas fabrics.

For the quilting, I used some free motion tutorials from The Inbox Jaunt.

Ribbon Candy Quilting
Candy Stripes Quilting

Table topper quilted with ribbon candy tutorial from @theinboxjaunt I added my own circle candies in the squares.

I did my own peppermint candies in the larger squares and them some marble-like gum balls in some of the small squares.

And then bound it in the darker green.

And bound. Glad I went with green binding.

Quilting back. Yummy texture!

My oldest UFO

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Day 6 of the 31 day blogging challenge and I am really grateful I did not have to think up topics. Also this topic is hard.

What’s my oldest UFO? Well up until two0sih years ago I had a good answer for that!

Way back in 1995 or so when I started to really get into quilting, I started a quilt for kid #2. I had all these scraps from sewing clothing AND had just discovered this place in Quebec that made bedding and sold off their scraps in 100 pound garbage bags, which was SUPER COOL.

Somewhere in this pile of cast offs but still decent to work with was a huge amount of pinks and blues and four lonely Holly Hobbie panels. I incorporated those and a ton of strips into what I could probably call my first moder-ish improv quilt.

And? I had recently been gifted a serger for mother’s day! So what better way to put it to use than serge this all together! Some of the fabric was super flimpy, even if it was poly cotton sheeting.

Then in a stunning display of further brilliance, somewhere along the line I decided I should HAND QUILT it.

I don’t know if you know anything about hand quilting, but one thing which is maybe not known but also should never come up because WHO would think of this is – you really cannot hand quilt through any seams that have been SERGED. It’s too thick with too much thread on that seam.

Anyway. That quilt followed me around the province for a while and every so often the husband and I would take a stab at it. (Get it?? Ha!.. er.. oh well.)

Finally, not only does that kid grow up and move out and have a life of her own, most of the rest did too. Then she bought a house and we had a pandemic and I ran out of things to do. So I told myself finished was better that perfect, and this kid was also turning THIRTY so maybe if I finally finished this quilt it would make a great present?

I put it on the longarm and finished it off. It was a hot mess but it was DONE.

Or, done being quilted. You see, I was using up scraps and had done three sides in Prairie Points, which meant I had to very carefully turn down the back edge and hand stitch or carefully machine stitch it in place. Fearing another decade passing before any hand stitching taking place, I machine stitched it the best I could, Sometimes twice in some places.

She got it that Christmas.

My Favourite tools

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For the blogging challenge day 4 the topic is my favourite tools. I could fill a shop with the things I love to use for quilting and.. hey wait a minute, I Did! I’ll narrow it down to my top five tools I can’t live without.

Stork scissors – my grandmother either gave me a pair or I inherited them, and I also went and bought a second pair. While the classic gold stork is available everywhere, I carry these rainbow unicorn ones for fun. I’m really trying not to own a third pair, even if I do leave both pairs lying around and always have to hunt for them.

Seam tape – this is washi tape with 1/4″ seams marked on it, and for many people they are underwhelmed. But I have this on the bed of my machine and the extension table and it really helps me keep my seam straight and accurate – especially when I’m sewing fast! It will lift up over time, but it’s a big roll and you can place it on all your machines. I even use it to line up seams when I do the diagonal bit for binding. I never mark these!

Numbered pins – I got these one year as a Christmas present and I use them all the time to make rows as I put them together. They are very long pins as well, so I’ve been known to grab one in a hurry to pin a pile of pieces together too.

Ergonomic rotary cutter – I have a few rotary cutter bodies, and some I like for different reasons, like the price. But when my hand or arm hurts, I reach for this ergonomic cutter. You can lock the blade open so you don’t have to squeeze it to stay open, thus making it easier on your grip if it’s weak that day.

Design Wall – this is a sleeper hit, as you don’t realize how much you actually DO use it and it’s way better than arranging blocks and pieces on the floor or bed. Worth every penny and you don’t even think about how you’re actually using it every day.

Ideas for quilts with panels

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Some people love working with panels, some hate them! Either way, they give you a lot to talk about.

When you sign up for our newsletter, we send you a free pattern for a throw quilt using a standard sized panel for the center, with three matching fabrics. I thought I’d do some mockups with some panels we have in stock to see how they’d look all made up.

I used the EQ software for this. Once I had the pattern diagram in the program, it is super easy to recolor in new fabrics!

This is our Save the Bees panel. I choose a bright yellow and ebony black from our Canvas blenders line. Simple and easy! I didn’t choose a third accent color and used black there as well. For dark quilts like this I recommend using a black batting as well. Any bearding from the batting will be black and not noticeable.

Then I did a mockup using Feathered Nest. I actually tried a few different combos with the fabrics. Every single one looked great, no matter what fabric I used or where it was placed.

This fabric is so new I’ve barely mentioned it! Father Christmas arrived early and I had to see what it looked like in a quilt. Stunning, but we all know I am a sucker for the blue and white snowflakes. I played around with the accent colors and placement here.

Even though the pattern I used is fairly simple, there’s lots of room for customization – changing the borders, substituting blocks in the corners, and placing different fabrics in alternate areas. Which panel would you pick?

If you are looking for more ideas to use panels in quilts, I made a Pinterest board for you to peruse.