I made a quick video to help you in choosing fabrics for the Tango workshop. Questions? Email me using diane@stashbandit.net.
Still need a ticket for Oct 18 class? Find all the info and get a ticket here.
I love a Windmill block, and this scrappy I Spy version comes together quickly. The blocks finish at 16″ and the quilt is 52″ x 52″.
It can be tricky to get novelty fabrics to play together nicely. I think a lot of I Spy quilts look pretty chaotic.
I appreciate it when quilters are willing to try something new. Here is some of their work.
Asterisk is a design by Karen Griska that I teach with her permission. It’s such a great block that looks hard but sews easy. It doesn’t get any better than that!
A nasty stomach virus is making its way through the family of two adults and four children.
We decided late last night that I should postpone my visit. While I’m bummed not to see them, there’s an up side:
I’ve been brainstorming all night (when I should have been sleeping) about how to spend the time. Here are some of the things I want to do.
I’m giving a talk on bricks, which are one of my favorite shapes. There is so much you can do with them!
And here’s another brick quilt, just for fun.
My favorite brick sizes are listed below as finished size first, followed by the dimensions you’ll need to cut the patches.
The tiniest patch above is cut 1″ x 1-1/2″ to finish at 1/2″ x 1″. It is little!!
The largest patch above is cut 4-1/2″ x 8-1/2″. The largest brick I have ever used was cut 6-1/2″ x 12-1/2″. It was used in a 24″ block.
To figure out your own custom brick sizes, first think about the finished dimensions you want, for instance, you want a brick that’s 9″ long. Since it has to be twice as long as wide, half of 9 is 4-1/2.
So you know the brick will finish 4-1/2″ x 9″. NOW add 1/2″ to each of those numbers to get the cut size. In this case the cut size would be 5″ x 9-1/2″.
One of the first bricks quilt I ever made featured Baby Windmill blocks. I created darker windmills to get the effect of “borders” for this design I call Framework.
Somehow this helps to organize all the scrappy chaos and the quilt is more pleasing to the eye than it would be without the false borders.
When the patchwork is very small like this, you can use all types of cotton quilt fabric together: reproductions, batiks, florals, novelty and so on.
I use contrast in most of the blocks so that the windmill is easily visible. Most blocks outside of the border areas have a windmill that is darker than the background.
The windmills in Framework are made from patches cut 1-1/2″ x 2-1/2″. Each block finishes at 4″. You can find instructions for these little blocks in my Baby Windmills basic tutorial post.
Here’s another small quilt made from Baby Windmills. It’s called Christmas Dance. I went scrappy within a limited palette. This is a very entertaining kind of sewing!
There are seats in a StarQuar Scrap Quilts workshop on Zoom Saturday, Feb 24 from 9 to 3 Central, and I’d love to have you grab one! The cost for the workshop is $65 and you can sew from the comfort of home. A guild in Massachusetts is opening the class to those outside of their membership, so no matter where you live, you’re invited in for a day of fun, playful adventure. Click here to learn more or register.
I’ll share all my best tips and tricks with you in this one day workshop. You’ll be invited to go way beyond stars, too. StarQuars become all sorts of interesting things when you unleash your imagination!
It is so much fun to see how beautifully your scraps can play together. We’ll talk about color, value, contrast, scale and more.
This workshop will not be recorded.
I can’t wait to meet you!
Quilt on,
Ricky Tims said something really important on my episode of The Quilt Show, which has just been released. He said that when you have a creative block,
And I have an idea for WHAT you can sew! Check out my tutorial for Baby Windmills. The cutting is simple, the piecing is fast and easy, and you’ll be unstuck in no time!
Go to the basic tutorial for Baby Windmills now.
Piece,
Monday, April 17, 11 to 1 Central, $35 on Zoom (recording available after live event)
I’ve been binding my quilts by machine for 25 years and they’ve stood the test of time. Come and see how you can bind quilts quickly and beautifully on your machine.
Saturday, April 22, 9 to 4 Pacific, 11 to 6 Central via Zoom, $75 (non-member price)
There are seats open in this class sponsored by East Bay Heritage Quilters. Come and get started on this beautiful quilt that looks great in any fabric genre. So much fun!!!
Tango created in EQ8
Tango by Stephanie Lockhart
Live session, Friday, April 14, 10 to 4, $55
Get more info or register now.
I came up with a new design that I hoped would teach a variety of skills without being too difficult while still being attractive. I wanted something that would lend itself to whatever color scheme a beginner could imagine.
My first idea was this nine block quilt with two kinds of stars. But I was teaching this at Mangelsen’s in Omaha and we only had two sessions on the calendar—one full day and one half day, with a couple of weeks for sewing at home in between.
As I developed the class, I thought maybe a quilt of this size might overwhelm some beginners, so I designed a smaller option with just four blocks.
You don’t know exactly how a class will go until you teach it for the first time. As it turned out, some people chose the small quilt but several wanted a bigger project. I was so glad I had both available.
This simple block is a good one for beginners. It forces them to test and adjust the seam allowance. If they’re off by 1/8″ on each seam, the block will be 5/8″ too small in one direction. People are surprised by how skinny (“scant”) the seam allowance needs to be.
so I presented an alternate coloring. People embraced the idea and some beautiful color schemes emerged in class.
Friendship Star seemed like a good block for beginners to learn half-square triangles and the basic idea of sewing patches into rows before sewing the rows together.
I also decided to give them a taste of improvisational patchwork with an easy wonky star block. The results were fascinating, as students did this work at home after trying it quickly in class.
I loved Rita’s wonky star, above. You need only to suggest a shape, and a viewer’s eye will fill in the rest. Even though all of her points are not pointed, the star is still evident. Our minds fill in whatever is missing.
Dorothy had different star points on her wonky creation. Hers are very small and that’s just fine, too. Our eyes still know it’s a star.
Everyone got pretty far on their projects and I was really pleased with how well they did.
They were really brave to try walking foot quilting in class. We used gently waving lines as our starting point.
Deb has experience as a quilter so she quilted straight lines using painter’s tape to guide her. Aren’t her colors pretty?
Ann is not a beginner but she came with her daughter Denise, who is. Ann’s patriotic quilt is a little larger so she can use it as a throw at home. She made 12 blocks and I love how she moved the values around for different effects.
Denise made really brave choices all along the way, and I think her results are wonderful. This is a happy quilt!
You can imagine how much fun it is for a teacher to introduce students to the joy of making quilts. And when it’s for the first time, my gosh, it doesn’t get much better than that!
If you’re local, I think we will put Learn to Quilt on the schedule at Mangelsen’s again in the fall. If you’re from anywhere else in the world and you’d like a beginning class online, please let me know in the comments. I’d be happy to consider doing a workshop on Zoom.
Quilt on,