Creating Blocks With The Sidekick Shapes

Creating Blocks With The Sidekick Shapes | Quilts By Jen Hey Everyone, welcome back to Stash Blasting Wednesday.

Cabin Window Quilt

Christine Baker - Fairfield Road Designs: Cabin Window Our Cabin Window pattern is now available on both our website - www.uppercanadaquiltworks.com or on Craftsy as a pattern download. It was featured in the Northcott ad in Fons and Porter magazine and is a fast and easy quilt to make as a gift!  Cabin Window pattern Just look at these yummy fabrics in the Stonehenge Wilderness line!!

January

Kathy K. Wylie Quilts – January It has been quite some time since I shared the progress of my quilt about time. But since the quilt depicts each month of the year, I thought I would wait until that month to reveal it. So here we are, in January. As winter kicks into high gear in January, and our activities are sometimes limited by the ice and snow, a serene stillness emerges within the space it creates. In this quietness, just like the dormant plants beneath the snow, new life, new ideas are percolating. This is a wonderful time of year to return to our creative gifts, when we have that space to hear ourselves think and develop our designs.

How To Finish A Quilt With No Binding

How To Finish A Quilt With No Binding | Quilts By Jen Hey Everyone, welcome back to Technique Tuesday.

Quilting Beautiful and Bountiful Sunflowers

Beautiful And Bountiful Sunflowers | Quilts By Jen Jennifer Houlden recommends how to add vitamins C & D to our very dreary winter. Check out the variety of inspiring and sunny quilted sunflowers in her post. See ways to make the most of your fabric stash.

Sewing the Snowball Block - Part 2

Welcome back to the What's Good for the Gal is Good for the Guyquilt challenge. Yesterday, my plan was to sew the snowball block together, but I just had to share a few other features with you about the Pfaff Creative 4.5. As well as, make templates to create the block in a slightly different method than usual. So, today, we're sewing the snowball block - part 2!

All 36 five-inch squares have been cut using the boxboard template and the background squares have been cut diagonally once to give us triangles. There're 144 of them to be exact.

Yesterday, I didn't mention which thread I'm going to use to piece the blocks and quilt. I've decided on beige thread as it's neutral and will blend with all the fabrics. It's a 50 weight Egyptian cotton thread called Konfetti from Wonderfil.

Konfetti thread for piecing

Sewing the pieces together

Centering the triangles

The triangles are sewn to the long diagonal side of the snowball piece cut from the feature fabric. When placing the triangle on the snowball piece, it will hang over a ¼″ on each end. This is to ensure it's centered properly.

Because I'm sewing the pieces on the bias, I've made sure that the IDT system is engaged in the back of the quarter-inch foot to ensure there's a smooth feed of fabric and no stretching of the bias edges.

Triangles centered in corners

Another way to center blocks that is very accurate goes like this:

Fold the triangle in half with right sides facing each other. Give it a finger press down the fold to create a crease.

Fold the snowball piece in half along the diagonal edge being used with wrong sides of fabric together. Give the fold a finger a press to create a crease marking the center. 

 

Two pieces with center creases

Line up the two creases. 

Creases marked with chalk and in line with each other

The creases will nest together when the triangle is placed on top of the other piece of fabric.

Creases nested together

Sew a ¼″ seam allowance and press the triangle to the corner. The chalk lines I placed for a visual of where the creases fall, line up perfectly with this method. Doing this is a bit more time consuming, but it does ensure all the triangles are centered perfectly.

Chalk lines match up perfectly

Chain sewing

Chain sewing is one of the fastest ways to sew many pieces together in a timely fashion. There's no cutting of threads between pieces and the pieces being sewn together just keep being fed under the foot until the pile comes to an end. There's a big long chain flowing out from under the presser foot at the back of the machine when you're done.

Two key features to make chain sewing even more efficient and effective are the needle down position and foot hover. The needle down position is found on the front of the machine and is the last button in the horizontal row of buttons. When engaged, the green light is on.

Needle down position engaged

Hover position

The hover position is awesome; one of my favourite features on the Creative 4.5.

What is hover? 

It's when the foot hovers a fraction of an inch above the fabric when the machine has stopped sewing. The needle must be in needle down position in order for the hover feature to be engaged. Once the needle down position is turned off, the foot won't hover, but will stay down on top of the fabric. 

Foot in hover position

The advantage of the hover position is a new piece can be fed under the foot, when chain sewing, without having to lift up the presser foot manually. It also allows for easy pivoting of fabric under the foot with the needle in place. 

No hover position, but you have a knee rest? Then, the hover position can be mimicked by gently raising the presser foot with the knee lift when adding pieces to the chain. The knee lift is a tool that fits into a hole on the front of the machine and is operated by your knee to lift the presser foot up and down.

Knee lift attached to machine

The chain piecing made easy and fast work of sewing the triangle corners onto the snowball blocks. When done sewing, I press the seams towards the corner on each triangle to make a square. The square measures 5-inches. 

Arranging the snowball blocks

The snowball blocks are now all created and it's time to arrange them on my portable design wall. I make sure to arrange them so the light and dark snowballs are alternating, as well as, alternating the background pieces. 

Once happy with the placement of the fabrics and seeing it all flow together, I can start sewing four snowball blocks together to create a 9½″ square.

Background pieces

I cut the background fabric into 5-inch squares. I add them into the mix with the snowball blocks to create corners for the quilt. 

Some are sewn into pairs, some are matched up with a snowball block, while others, are sewn into a 4-patch block. I'm hoping by alternating the two background fabrics, the background will have more texture.

Snowball and background blocks on design wall

I'm not going to sew these blocks together just yet, as one never knows if I might change my mind on the configuration of these blocks along the way. I don't want to have to do any "reverse sewing"!

Sewing the snowball block - Part 2 has made me feel there's progress being made on the What's Good for the Gal is Good for the Guy challenge quilt. I'm done for this month, but I promise to be back next month to continue the progress on this quilt challenge, as well as, to show you more features of the Pfaff Creative 4.5.

Happy Quilting

WEEKLY GIVEAWAY! Pfaff® Embroidery Design Collection: Romantic Decor

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Congratulations to N. H., winner of the Sulky® Stabilizer Sampler Pack from our last weekly giveaway contest!

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Sewing the Snowball Block

I’m all set to start sewing the snowball block today. This is block number one of three which I used in the designing of the What's Good For The Gal is Good for the Guy challenge quilt. The snowball block is a common quilt block and there's a very straightforward piecing method for it.

Yesterday, I familiarized myself with many of the basic sewing features on the Pfaff Creative 4.5, so I can get going sewing blocks today. As I continue creating the challenge quilt, I'm sure there will be many more features to share with you. I didn't even touch the tip of the iceberg yesterday with the few features I did highlight!

Standard sewing method

The usual way to sew this block is to place small squares at the corners of each larger square and sew corner-to-corner across the small squares along a marked line. Once done, the excess fabric is trimmed off leaving a ¼″ seam allowance and the corners are pressed to create a complete square.

I've decided to change how I make the block from the usual method because I've a limited fabric supply. I don't want to waste any of the fabric as I'm pretty sure I'm going to need every bit of it. 

I'll be using a template to make the block, so there's little-to-no fabric waste.

 

Standard method for making a snowball block with squares in the corners

Picking the fabrics

There seem to be an equal number of light and darker-colored pieces of fabric in the 10-inch squares I have to use. I need 36 of the 5-inch blocks, so I decide to use half light and half darker fabrics to create some contrast within the snowball blocks. 

For the background fabrics, I'll use both fabrics for the corner triangles. This will allow the fabrics to mix and give a more textured background.

The Eclectic Elements fabric

Making a template

There are three options for making a template. 

Option 1 - box board template

I did create one block as described above and then I made a template by tracing an outline of the snowball block onto a piece of box board. Cutting out the box board along the lines leaves me with a template to use to cut out the 5-inch squares of fabric that I'll cut from the 10-inch squares. Don't use cardboard for this as it's too soft and will slowly become smaller with usage as the sides get pushed in by the rotary cutter.

Standard method making snowball block with squares in the corners

Option 2 - freezer paper template

If you don't have box board on hand, then freezer paper will also work to make the template. The freezer paper has the advantage that it can be ironed onto the fabric to ensure no slippage when cutting.

Several freezer paper templates will be required as it can only be ironed so many times before it won’t stick to the fabric anymore. The shiny side of the freezer paper is put face down on top of the fabric and ironed in place. It peels off with no harm to the fabric. 

 

Freezer paper template

Option 3 - plastic template

Lastly, a piece of template plastic can be cut into the correct shape just as the box board was. It will be an ever-lasting template. I didn’t have any template plastic and found this placemat in the back room that would have worked just as well.

Also x-ray film makes great templates as well but, unfortunately, not many of us have access to this product. 

I didn't cut up the placemat but, if I had a Sharpie, it would have been the best tool to use to draw the template onto the mat. Sharp scissors would probably have been the easiest method to cut it out. 

I've never used a lot of templates in my years of quilting, but they do have their place. To ensure optimal use of the fabric I need to use one today.

A plastic placemat to replace template plastic

Changing up the sewing method

Using the box board template, I cut all four corners off each of the 36 five-inch squares for the snowball block. Using the template saves background fabric because now, instead of a square on each corner, a triangle can be used. This background fabric square can be cut into two triangles with no wastage of fabric.

There's a bit of waste on each of the feature fabric squares when the four corners are removed. I put these pieces into a plastic bag for future use. 

Boxboard template in position and ready to use

One drawback to this method is the seams being sewn together have been cut on the bias.

Bias edges can stretch out of shape, but, if handled carefully, there usually isn’t a problem. With the IDT system engaged and the ¼-inch foot with the guide in place, sewing the bias edges together is no problem at all. Everything stays in place and is perfectly matched up.

What is the IDT system?

The IDT system stands for integrated dual feed that delivers even feed of fabric from the bottom and top. In other words, it moves smoothly and evenly over the feed dogs and under the presser foot no matter the type of fabric or number of layers being sewn together. This results in perfect seams on all fabric. 

Another reason for using the IDT system is that pinning is not required with the even feed of the fabric. If you're sewing long pieces together, then the odd pin may be needed just to keep the two pieces together and prevent them from flapping apart. 

It's easily engaged by pulling on the lever at the back of the machine and placing it in the slot at the back of the foot. 

 

IDT system engaged

Not all of the feet made for the Pfaff machines are IDT compatible. If they are, they're easily recognized by the slot in the back. 

Today, I'm sewing with the Perfect ¼″ Foot that is IDT compatible and has a right-sided guide to ensure the fabric stays lined up under the foot for a perfect ¼″ seam allowance. 

Perfect ¼″ foot with IDT compatibility

If you don't have a dual feed system on your machine and are finding that the bias edges are stretching, some spray starch can be used to stiffen them up a tad. I don’t use starch lot but, when I do, I use Mary Ellen’s Best Press, which doesn’t leave a residue and the fabric isn’t stiff as a board afterwards.

Pieces ready for sewing

Stitch info

The machine is threaded, the correct foot is in place, the IDT system is engaged, and the pieces are ready for sewing. Next step is to make sure that a straight stitch has been selected along with the appropriate stitch length. 

The home page of the LCD screen shows which stitch is being used, the stitch length/width, what foot to use and so on. It's indicating that I'm using stitch number one, which is a straight stitch with a default length of 2.5. Stitch number one is highlighted in the photo below with the pink box around it. 

To change any of this, use the stylet and touch on the appropriate icon to make changes. Use the plus and minus icons above and below the stitch length icon to increase or decrease the stitch length. Below, the photo shows where these buttons are located. 

Home page

I didn't get very far with sewing the snowball block today because I just had to discuss some more of the awesome features on the the Pfaff Creative 4.5. Tomorrow, I promise, we'll be sewing the snowball block together and getting the What's Good for the Gal is Good for the Guy challenge quilt underway.

Happy Quilting

A little more on The Pfaff Creative 4.5 Sewing Machine

I know you're excited about watching me sew and quilt the What's Good for the Goose is Good for the Ganderquilt but here's a little more on the Pfaff Creative 4.5 sewing machine before we sew it together!

Bobbin winding

The bobbin can be wound from the main spool of thread before threading the machine, as well as, when the machine is threaded. It can also be wound from the secondary spool stand using a second spool of thread. All the instructions, along with easy to follow diagrams, are found on the manual within the machine or the paper copy.

Spool stands and bobbin winding area

When the bobbin is engaged to be wound, a dialogue box shows on the LCD screen. Using the stylus, touch the start icon to wind the bobbin. It will stop automatically when full. The speed at which the winding occurs can also be adjusted with the slide control. 

Touch the start icon to wind bobbin

Threading the machine

Threading the machine is easy and straight forward. Once you've done it a couple of times, it will be like second nature to you. If you forget how, the instructions with diagrams can be brought up for easy reference right on the LCD screen.

Instructions for threading machine

The spool stands and thread guides are all accessed under the cover at the top of the machine. If using the vertical spool stand, then the cover needs to stay open while sewing. But, if you're using the horizontal spool stand, the cover can be closed when sewing. 

I love this cover! I used to have to always unthread my machine every time I was done sewing because I had a cat who loved to eat thread. With this cover, just close it and it's out of sight, out of mind. 

Spool of thread on stand

Needle Threader

Once the machine has been threaded, use the built-in needle threader to thread the needle. It’s quick and easy, especially for those of us with not-so-great eye sight. 

Step-by-step instructions are found in the machine's manual (see photo above under the manual section).

Needle threader in ready position

Presser foot lever

The Creative 4.5 doesn't have a presser foot lever at the back of the machine to release the presser foot up and down. Instead, it has two buttons on the front of the machine. A touch of the bottom one drops the presser foot down to the sewing, while a touch of the top one brings it back up again. The presser foot can also be dropped down with a tap of the foot control. Getting used to using the buttons can take time if you’ve always had a lever, but soon you won’t even reach for it.

Presser foot buttons

Stop and go options

There are two ways to run the machine. The first option is with the foot control pedal. It's nice and large with lots of space for my foot. It's very responsive and doesn't seem to move around on the carpet. 

The second option is to use the button beside the presser foot control buttons, which can be seen in the photo above. It has an arrow and square on it. When pushed, this button will start the machine and, when pushed again, will stop the machine. The foot control pedal cannot be connected otherwise the button will not work. 

I've always preferred using the foot control pedal. I just feel I've more control of my work. But, for those people who have poor sensation in their feet, the start and go button is a great feature, especially for doing free motion quilting where foot control is crucial. 

Foot control pedal

That pretty much covers the basics of the machine that are a must to know prior to sewing. Now, it's time to start sewing the What's Good for the Gal is Good for the Guy challenge quilt. There may be a couple of features I missed while introducing the Pfaff Creative 4.5, but I’ll catch them tomorrow when I start sewing. It's alway better to know a little more on the Pfaff Creative 4.5 Sewing Machine.

Happy Quilting

Introducing the Pfaff Creative 4.5 Sewing Machine

While I finalize the design for the What's Good For the Gal is Good for the Guy quilt, it's a good time to be introducing the Pfaff Creative 4.5 sewing machine. Like I said the other day, it's a machine with all the bells and whistles. Looks pretty sleek and streamlined too. 

The Pfaff Creative 4.5 is a fully computerized sewing machine with all kinds of wonderful features. Since all I'll be using the machine for this week is piecing, I only need to familiarize myself with the basics.

The Pfaff Creative 4.5 sewing machine

The Creative 4.5 Manual

The manual is a rather thick booklet and it contains all the information needed to run this machine. Oh, I think I forgot to mention the front of this machine is one of my favorite colors - purple.

Creative 4.5 manual

If you don't want to read the hard copy manual, well, you're in luck because the whole manual, along with a help system, is available on the machine. I did say it's fully computerized!

The LCD screen is nice and large making it easy to read the manual on the machine. Using the stylus makes it easy to navigate and scroll through the menus.

Complete manual available on the sewing machine

Sewing area

The throat area is a spacious 10-inches from the needle to the machine body giving lots of room to manoeuver quilts through when quilting. The throat height is 5-inches. 

There are 3 LED lights to light up the sewing area. I always say, the more light, the better, and the Creative 4.5 is very well lit.

Large throat area and ample lighting

Accessories

The machine comes with a wide range of feet and other tools that are all neatly stored in the accessory box attached to the machine. This accessory box is easily removed to allow for the use of the free arm when sewing a sleeve, for example, or when the embroidery unit needs to be attached. (more about it another day)

Fully equipped accessory box

It's important to know the features on your sewing machine, it makes all your quilting and sewing that much smoother. Introducing the Pfaff Creative 4.5 sewing machine is like taking a gander at your manual with a friend to guide you. I hope you're enjoying this review. Stay tuned for more features tomorrow.

Happy Quilting

Quilting Challenges

Over the next 2 to 3 weeks of blogging, I'll be focusing on one project and one project only. How many of you have been a part of quilting challenges? Well, I'm in the thick of one right now. Elaine, one of the other QUILTsocial bloggers and I were each asked to create a quilt by the editor-in-chief of A Needle Pulling Thread magazine. We will blog about our experience designing and creating this quilt. The quilts are to be gender specific - one for a male and one for a female. I'm designing the male one. The name of the challenge is What’s Good For the Gal is Good For the Guy. A rather witty name. 

There are a few rules to this challenge. I was given a little blurb on the personality of the male, for whom this quilt is being designed and he's all logic, mathematics, geometry and science. He's in university and 20 years old. 

When the challenge was presented to me, I thought the male version would be easier. Now that I'm in the thick of it, well, I'm not so sure. I have to say that it took me a while to get my head around what I would design because, you see, we each have the same fabric to use and a limited amount of it. So, nothing too complicated, but nothing too basic either.

My supplies of tools and fabric for the challenge

The Fabrics

The main fabric or feature fabric was donated for this quilting challenge by Coats and Clark and is called Eclectic Elements by Tim Holtz. There are mostly 10-inch squares, some fat eights and a couple of fat quarters. The fabric is very cool with all kinds of eclectic designs - road maps, letters, signs of all sorts, bottle caps, stripes and much much more. You see the supply is a bit limited, so no room for error when creating this one and no "do overs". The color of the fabric has a sepia look to it.

The Eclectic Elements Fabric

For the background fabric, I'm using a couple denim blue-colored fabrics - both with a bit of texture that work well together and complement the feature fabric. All of this will be perfect for a boy.

The two blue background fabrics

The backing fabric was donated by Northcott and is a gorgeous denim blue-colored flannel that looks like a Harris Tweed. It's from the Man About Town fabric line.

Blue flannel for backing

Templates

I picked out a couple of interesting templates from the H. A. Kidd website to use for creating some cool geometric shapes as quilting motifs. When they arrived in the mail, I thought: These are "way cool" and I'll be able to make shapes to be appliqued onto the quilt! If the shapes from these templates were used to piece blocks, they would require inset seams and, oh boy, I'm not a fan of those. So, I'll stick to applique, of which I'm a fan, especially the fusible web type.

H. A. Kidd was very kind to donate these three templates, as well as, the batting for the challenge. 

The first template is the Jelly Pointer Template from SewEasy.

The Jelly Pointer template

The second template is the Jelly Monster Template, also from SewEasy.

The Jelly Monster Template

So many shapes can be made with the two templates from above. I had no idea when I was looking at them on the website that they did all this. 

And, finally, a 9 Piece Haxagon Set also from SewEasy.

Hexagon Template Set

Thread

I’ll be using a variety of thread from Wonderfil for piecing, stitching around the applique, and quilting.

A variety of Wonderfil threads

The Sewing Machine

For this challenge, Pfaff has provided me with the Creative 4.5 sewing machine with all the bells and whistles, including an embroidery unit. I’ll be doing a lot of manual reading with this machine to get to know it.

The Pfaff Creative 4.5

First things first! I best figure out a design for this quilt because What’s Good For the Gal is Good For the Guy. Quilting challenges are so much fun and they certainly are great for getting the creative juices flowing. 

Happy Quilting!

Quilted Snowflake

This week, we've been exploring a variety of machine cutwork techniques while making lacy snowflakes, glittery snowflakes, snowflake quilt blocks, and stained glass snowflakes. Each technique involved tracing a snowflake design onto water-soluble stabilizer, stitching it to fabric, cutting out the design, and satin-stitching over the cut-out edges. In a fraction of the time, we were able to create the look of heirloom embroidery. Today we’re going to take a slightly different approach and make a quilted snowflake with cut-away trapunto.

Quilted Snowflake

Trapunto adds marvelous dimension to quilts. It's defined as “quilting that has an embossed design produced by outlining the pattern with single stitches and then padding it with yarn or cotton”. Originally, trapunto was done by slitting the backing fabric in order to stuff the design with batting. The slit was then slip-stitched closed or covered with a second backing fabric. With “cut-away trapunto”, the extra stuffing is added before the quilt is layered and quilted.

It occurred to me the same Sulky Ultra Solvy that we've been using for our cutwork snowflakes could be used as a quilting template. We can trace the snowflake onto the Solvy, pin it on the quilt, stitch, then soak the quilt to dissolve the Solvy. While I still consider this an excellent idea, I discovered that Ultra Solvy is not the only wash-away stabilizer available from Sulky. I decided to try a new one (to me): Sticky Fabri-Solvy.

Sticky Fabri-Solvy

This stabilizer is brilliant! It comes on a roll or in a 1-yard package or in 8-1/2″ x 11″ sheets that run through your printer. As the name would suggest, it looks like white fabric (not clear, like Ultra Solvy) and the back is sticky. How wonderful for positioning it onto the quilt layers! Andit dissolves in water. Fantastic!

For a cut-away trapunto snowflake, trace the design onto your choice of wash-away stabilizer. I had to divide my snowflake in half and use two sheets of 8-1/2″ x 11″ Sticky Fabri-Solvy to fit. Peel off the backing paper and stick the Fabri-Solvy (or pin the Ultra Solvy) onto your quilt top.

Pin a layer of high-loft batting – the stuffing – under the motif. I've been enjoying good results using wool batting for this layer.

Layer fabric with high-loft batting

Stitch the two layers together, following the marked design, using water-soluble thread in the needle and regular thread in the bobbin.

Stitch on marked lines with water-soluble thread

From the back, carefully trim the batting close to the stitching so that only the design is “stuffed”.

Cut away high-loft batting

High-loft batting cut away from quilt top

From this point, construct the quilt as usual. Layer the quilt top with batting and backing fabric and baste. Quilt by stitching over the same design lines, this time using your choice of quilting thread. For best results, add dense quilting in the background around the motif. This will compress the background and make the stuffed areas stand out.

Compress background with dense stitching

Once the quilting is complete, wash or soak the quilt. Not only will the Solvy disappear along with the marked lines, but the first layer of water-soluble thread will also dissolve. All that remains is a beautiful embossed snowflake.

Dissolve Fabri-Solvy in water

So, if you’re not using cutwork to make lacy snowflakes, glittery snowflakes, snowflake quilt blocks, or stained glass snowflakes, you might be using it for a quilted snowflake! Heirloom needlework techniques are all made possible with the magic of wash-away stabilizers. Winter may mean snow, but we can cuddle up in our sewing rooms and bring the beauty of snowflakes into our homes.