All About Christmas fabric has delivered and is in a shop near you. Find a list of retailers in my last blog post here.
This collection is beautiful! It includes the Christmas story from Luke 2 making it VERY Christmas-y and we especially love those details. In addition, the printing quality is wonderful thank you to our fabric partners at Riley Blake Designs.
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So, here we go with another little Sew-A-Long. This time it will be a mini. The two items that we will be sharing over the three weeks are,
Our three large snowman blocks (row 4)
Reverse raw edge appliqué blocks (rows 1 & 5)
This week we will be looking at number 2, reverse raw edge fusible appliqué for the ornament blocks. The snowflake blocks are done the same way only much less detail so we will be focusing on row one.
Do you have your pattern and fabric ready? If not, visit this link to find a shop.
Are you ready to sew?! Let’s go! According to the All About Christmas pattern instructions, it is important ‘To Get Started’ by cutting fabrics for the large snowmen blocks FIRST. This assures that you will have the larger fabric cuts set aside when you need them. Follow the cover art for the fabric choices and make cuts according to the pattern instruction page(s) and directional fabrics. If you are new to the technique of reverse raw edge appliqué I highly suggest reading the pattern in it’s entirety before starting or cutting into your fabrics.
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Since some of our designs for this quilt were stencil-like with white as the main center image (see the snowflake and ornament rows), we selected this reverse appliqué technique. Often with appliqué we will use a second interfacing product to mask the background fabric from showing through our white however, we found this to be a better option for the ornament and snowflake blocks on this quilt. The photos below will offer a visual aid so-to-speak to support this explanation.
Once you’ve cut your fabric squares for blocks in Rows 1 and 5, you can begin tracing the designs onto your fusible web product according to manufacturers directions. We like Pellon Featherweight Fusible 805. Be sure to trace all of the pieces that make up the inside ornament designs before fusing. You will be using those to help your fabric remain as a continual image. Fuse to wrong side of fabric considering whether your fabric square will be using a directional print and align accordingly.
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When you go to cut out the ornament rounds, be careful not to cut through the outside square itself or those tiny pieces. You can see at the bottom of our ornament photo below where we began poking the scissors through to cut around the perimeter only. This way, when the traced ornament is removed, your background stays completely intact. Then cut your smaller (traced beforehand) pieces and set them aside somewhat in order, or you can number them if that helps.
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Once all of your ornament pieces are cut out you are ready to fuse. Sandwich the colored fabric silhouette squares on top of your Riley White squares that will show from underneath. You can place the pattern flipped upside down (since already in reverse) beneath your layered fabrics to use as your placement guide. Or, another method that we like to use, is a tracing paper door, as we call it. The photos below plus this link will explain. Simply put, we trace the block template image(s) onto ordinary tracing paper and pin down on one side of your block to help with accurate placement in the event the paper pattern does not show through your fabric. We also found that using tweezers was the easiest way to then nudge the tiny pieces into place. When you get them where you like, fuse!
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Here are our results. Now for the fun part, stitching them down. I will be using thread to match and a blanket style stitch. I find both are somewhat forgiving. You may choose to use any number of decorative stitching to add these details if you prefer over these tiny appliqué pieces. This is where your sewing skills will shine beyond my limited experience so please, send progress photos! And have fun of course 😉
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I hope you had fun sewing along with me! If you have any questions about this technique, leave a comment below! See you next week for the BIG snowmen blocks.
Since there is a lot of info to cover this last week will be in two parts.
Assuming that everyone has all of their blocks completed and trimmed or will have, it is time to assemble!
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To start assembling the quilt portion, I cut five one and a half inch strips of Riley White fabric for the short sashing pieces. Check your pattern for accurate amounts if you want to cut all at once. I inched my way into this process, no pun intended.
From my five I cut eight and a half inch lengths, enough to attach my first couple of horizontal rows of blocks together. Refer to your pattern cover for block placement.
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Beginning with block one (top left) lay one of your Riley White strips (1.5″ x 8.5″) on the right side of Block 1, right fabric sides together. Split the difference of the extra half inch between top and bottom of your block to be trimmed later.
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Sew together using a quarter inch seam.
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Press the seam toward your block.
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Repeat the steps to connect block one and two together with this same sashing strip. This time lay block two on top of sashing strip lining up at right (see photo), again right fabric sides together, being careful to also line up both blocks top to bottom. You may want to pin in place before sewing.
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Continue working this way until you have all of the top row of blocks connected. Then move on to row two!
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And so on, until you have all of the blocks that connect using the short sashing pieces as shown on the pattern cover art. Seeing it all come together is the most fun for me, agreed?
I will post Part B on Saturday so stay tuned.
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Embellish Options.
This festive project is loaded with possibilities to stitch on some fun extras! We plan to add buttons for our snowmen eyes and gingerbread man but remember to do this after your quilt top has been quilted.
I am happy to report that our piecing portion of our quilt is complete! Whew!!
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A couple of items I should have mentioned earlier, pressing your seams. Always press as you go is highly recommended for a neat job and press the seams toward the darker fabric whenever possible.
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And something I learned along the way to get my points closer to each other. Sew on the side that allows you to see your seam and stitch right across that. Who knew, not me. 😉
Below are the last four blocks that I saved until last. They appeared a bit more unfamiliar to me because of the corners which are all similar, and on an angle. However, following the sequence on the Pieced Blocks Guide in the pattern, I could quickly see that there was little to no difference in difficulty and all went smoothly as the others.
I think these are my best blocks to date! Perhaps I’m getting better the more I make.
In each block I did the corner work first. Once that was done, I attached pieces in the same sequence as all of the other blocks from Thursday’s post, horizontal rows. Last I attached the three horizontal rows from top to bottom, to complete.
Our gallery.
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Row 1, block 2.
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Row 4, block 3.
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Row 6, block 1.
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Row 7, block 6.
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Trimming.
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Trim each to eight inches, square for your seven and a half finish size blocks. In most cases ours only needed a smidgen cut off to clean up and even each block.
Again, voila!!
I feel quite accomplished or should I say quilt, and I hope you do too.
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Again, share, share, share:
When posting photos use #snowalong and #snowsweetfabric in your social media so we can find/see your progress.
Let us know if you post on Pinterest as well and we’ll add to our board.
Follow us here at JOY STUDIO for each step over five weeks to make this delightful and delicious quilt top.
Patterns and fabric are shipping now so check with your favorite shop for arrival times. MANY shops have ordered this so patterns, kits and fabric should be widely available.
If your local is still closed check the on line shops. Search Snow Sweet fabric and Sweet Snow-A-Long.
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J. Wecker Frisch
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Anyone can make this. We know because WE DID!! Lol And as you know, we are still new at this. I hope you can join us to make this really fun snowy quilt and cool off your summer!!!
This can be done in a couple of different ways however, I will only be describing how I actually, chose to finish this quilt.
Borders.
First up, the inner 1″ (finish size) black border. Make sure that your window blocks are squared up by trimming, measuring and placing your tracings over them before you add this border. Pay special attention to you last row of blocks so that all of the items will appear to be sitting on the bottom shelf of your window. It was necessary for me to trim mine about 1/2″. Then pin and sew with your 1/4″ seam.
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Secondly sew on your gray borders to three sides. Top, right and left. I cut them 2″ for an inch and a half finish.
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Bottom border.
Because I did not want to stitch around the appliquéd bricks after the borders were added to the quilt top, I simply strip pieced both of the borders together to treat the entire unit as the bottom border. Then I arranged the bricks (omitting one) making up the window sill approximately 1/4″ or so apart, evenly to fit directly under the black inner border. When I was satisfied with the placement, I fused the bricks to the gray and black unit, overlapping the seam slightly. This made stitching down the bricks much easier to manage than turning the entire quilt. I did however, stray from the pattern a bit. As you can see, the brick window ledge was confined to the bottom border only. You can choose to add two more bricks, one on each end after you add your side borders. I plan to do this as I show in the last photo in the segment below.
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If you made it through the Hat Shop SAL, be proud of yourself! I was, and also quite surprised. This was a very intimidating challenge for me but I pushed through and learned much by making this project. Now my top is off to the quilter and I will share the finished piece with you soon.
