Free Pattern Friday: Dresden Garden

I designed this as a free pattern for Red Rooster Fabrics several years ago. I took it down for awhile and then decided to put it back up. It's such a sweet quilt that uses quite a few different prints.

Dresden Garden quilt with Fleur du Jardin fabrics by Red Rooster

Did I ever tell you about how little fabric I was sent? To be fair, these were just the little samples that the manufacturer sent to the Marketing Rep. But, Leslie has known me for over 10 years and I have delivered designs and quilts with bits and pieces before.

Holy Cow! Bits and pieces about 1/8th yard in size with maybe 1/3 yard of that floral. Now you can see why I had to get creative with the colors!

Here is how I pieced the back:

Dresden Garden quilt back

Now, go back and look at the binding. Was I just trying to be clever? No way! I only had a little bit of each of the solid reading fabrics and so had to piece the binding. So, I put my thinking cap on and echoed the colors in the inner borders. I did sweat some bullets, truth be told.

You can download this FREE pattern on my own site: Dresden Garden Quilt. It is 27" x 27". The center is a 20" square.  The paper template for the dresden wedge is included, but if you have an 18 degree dresden tool with at least an 8" height, things will be easier to cut.

I sell an 8" Dresden ruler which comes with my Modern Vortex pattern.You can see it below.

Dresden Ruler #4 shown with my Modern Vortex pattern

You've seen my Modern Vortex quilt here before. You can get the digital pattern at my Etsy store. You can also order the printed pattern with the multi-sized ruler (18 degrees). Check both of them out at the store.

Modern Vortex quilt: 20" block, 28" x 28" quilt

I have taught this workshop a few dozen times in the past 5 years. I never, ever would have thought she would be such a Rock Star! But, oh the things you can do with a simple dresden ruler!

Hope you enjoy seeing this new, sweet quilt!

(Vintage) Windham Wednesdays

There are times I come back to a fabric collection over and over. There are several groups from Windham Fabrics that mix well and keep calling to me.

One is the Gabrielle Collection, which I used to make my LARGE Coffee Filter Mariner's Compass. (You can see some of my steps by clicking that link.) This is a fun workshop using 20" diameter coffee filters for the center compass. We draft it and then cut it apart into 8 sections and actually paper/foundation piece on each one! Then we piece the ring of flying geese. The whole center is about 30" x 30".

20" Coffee Filter Mariner's Compass

I still have some of that Gabrielle Collection left. My favorite piece is the floral background print for the center spokes. Yes, it looks more tan in the pic below, but it really is more cream.

Gabrielle Floral print

I did a lot of sewing with Addison. The first thing was to make a simple table topper. It is a variation on Baby Blocks. My friend cut all my diamonds with her Acu-Cut. These are 60 degree diamonds with a 3-1/2" height (from flat side to flat side).

Perfectly cut 60 degree diamonds

This was a Creative Grids pattern for about a year. I have packaged this with my Baby Blocks pattern (two patterns!) Check it out!

Connie's Runner

I had more of those diamonds. I made a Seven Sisters table topper. It was a popular workshop for a few years. Again, no y-seams. I also made it in other fabric combinations. You can see these at my Etsy shop.

Seven Sisters with NO y-seams. 37" x 42"

When the diamonds were cut with the Acu-Cut, there were some leftovers. Let's see those and what I did with them.

Two diamonds and the leftovers from each cut

 And the pile of leftovers from those Addison fabrics - left and right.

Leftovers from cutting the diamonds

I decided to make a batch of Twirling Hexagons. I stitched a right and left patch together, trimmed them up and then pieced the following blocks:

Twirling Hexagon blocks

Twirling Hexagon quilt using my 15 blocks (which finish to 8" high). I used cream small 60 degree triangles and large side 30 degree triangles. I pulled more fabrics from my stack of older Windham fabrics. I especially love that fabulous print border from the Carmen collection. This quilt top will go on the road with me when I teach my Big Block Hexagon workshop this Spring for the Sewing Expo.

Twirling Hexagons Quilt: 50" x 60"

Now, let's go REALLY FAR back in time to when I first used Addison to demonstrate making Garden Maze blocks. Do you remember these?

Garden Maze with thin strips

And this is the twin:

Garden Maze with thick strips

I finished one of these blocks with border fabric to make a 40" x 40" quilt.

Garden Maze Quilt with the thin strips

I have just enough butterfly border print (which is NOT Windham, but Benartex) to finish the Garden Maze center with the thick strips. Now, maybe a set of girl twins will enter my life!

Don't forget to visit my very old post about how to make these Garden Maze blocks. There is a link to a REALLY old tutorial from 1999 (yes, you read that right) when I published this in Quilt Magazine. I think you will like all the photos with the steps clearly outlined.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope you'll try out making your own Garden Maze block with an awesome center print.

1930s Feed Sack Quilts

Almost 30 years ago, a guild friend named Kathleen handed me a grocery bag full of fabric circles. These were no ordinary fabric circles. They were authentic 1930s Feed Sacks! It appeared that an anonymous quilter had cut them out, destined to be yo-yos. She thought I would be interested in playing with them. Holy cow! What a true find.

This quilt uses a few of those circles, and they aren't yo-yos! It was HAND QUILTED! Still one of my favorites, for sure.

Authentic Feed Sacks for Baskets

I did make  a few yo-yos, but the circles were calling me to become something else.

A few of the hundreds of circles made into yo yos

I had just started working for Quilt Magazine and I was intrigued with Drunkard's Path blocks and quilts, but NOT by the traditional way to make them. This next quilt uses those feed sack circles and other solids. The outer pink print border is an authentic feed sack!

This quilt has 8" finished blocks and finishes to 30" x 39". I sell it in my Etsy store.

1930s Feed Sack Love Ring quilt

What's my "cheater's" method for making these tiny Drunkard's Path blocks? I transferred fusible webbing to the wrong side of those circles and then appliquéd them to a background square. Then I cut that into four quarters. Oh, yes I did!

Here is a Trip Around the World using that technique. The little units finish to 2". The quilt is about 35" x 37". I finished it in 2001 and I called it Rescued Yo Yos.

Feed Sack Trip Around the World

I used a decorative stitch and some colored, rayon thread to stitch the circles down. Here are some up close:

Close up of the 2" little units

Here are a few orphan blocks I discovered a few weeks ago. They told me they would like to be finished into something quilty. The first is a single Basket block.

Single Basket Block

And from the wrong side, so you can see the stitching. I used a machine blanket stitch for this.

Basket Block from the wrong side

Here is Snowy Windows, though I think it is upside down.

Snowy Windows

Traditional Around the World block

Around the World

Baby Bunting Variation

Baby Bunting Variation

More purple and yellow combination. Yes, there were some solid colors in with that bag of print yoyos. This next one is called King Tut's Crown. But it also the same arrangement for the pink Love Ring above.

King Tut's Crown

I bet you're wondering where these names came from. I have a book by Pepper Cory called "Happy Trails." The theme is Drunkard's Path blocks and quilts. This is one of my favorite quilt reference books. Published in 1991. The names on these blocks are historically accurate. It's just that my technique is a bit renegade.

Another Baby Bunting block called Love Ring. But I call it Chicken a la Ring. Those are little chicks on that yellow print!

Chicken a la Ring

 And the last orphan block is Puzzle Boxes.

Puzzle Boxes (yes, that plaid is from the 1930s)

I do have other quilts that incorporated these Feed Sack circles and I'll share them sometime. I just thought it would be fun to pull these out of the closet and show them the light of day!

Free Pattern Friday: Baby Love

Here's a lovely little quilt pattern I designed for P and B Fabrics almost 2 years ago. They had a fabric collection called Welcome Baby and wanted something to do it justice. I thought: SIMPLE is best. Again, I let some of those fantastic baby prints do all the work.

Baby Love: 36" x 37"

These are reproduction prints from 1925. Can you see those sweet little cherubs in those wide strips in the center?

The full size letters are included in the pdf pattern. It is easy to piece and the appliqué is raw edge. Baby Love is a very scrappy quilt and uses quite a few different prints. Or you could control the color palette to be more gender specific. It's your call.

Enjoy!

The Quilting Rules I Like to Break

Rules. Rules. Rules. Holy cow - enough already. I was with my quilting church group the other day and a few of the ladies asked some honest questions:

1. Do you use steam when pressing your patches?
2. Why don't you pre-wash your fabric?
3. How come you fold your fabric into fourths when you cut strips?
4. Do you have your fabric torn or cut at quilt shops?
5. How about pressing seams - open or to the side?

I realized that I was the Queen of Shortcuts long ago and break many of those pesky RULES that some anonymous quilter made up and scared the you-know-what out of the newbies. It's not that these rules are wrong; it's just that they're not always right.

Here's my most recent quilt finish made with a specialty ruler (I have VERY few; many are redundant or unnecessary). The 6" Curvy Log Cabin ruler was designed for Creative Grids by my former editor Jean Ann Wright.

Chasing Pac Man

Because there are SO many seams coming together, I pressed the seams OPEN when joining the blocks. Here are one of each color (the quilt uses three of each color).

Four curvy log cabin blocks

And when they're joined:

Curvy blocks joined; seams pressed open

The answer to QUESTION #1 above about whether to use steam in my iron is a resounding YES! But I am careful to not twist or otherwise distort the bias. I think that was the reason for the "rule" in the first place. Right now I'm taking a 5 minute break from sewing another quilt with a LOT of seams and in order for them to lie flat, I have to use steam! I'll share that quilt in an upcoming post.

Question #2 about pre-washing my fabric is just me, but because the project my church friends and I were working on had pre-washed fabric, I realized WHY I don't like it in the first place. I DO NOT like the feel of the fabric after it's been washed and dried. It's too puffy, too flimsy and floppy. I like CRISP fabric in my hands. I know the stories about the chemicals on the fabric; if I didn't die last January when I printed 3,000 pages for patterns for upcoming workshops (death by printer toner), then I'm good to go.

Also, because I've been sewing for the camera for 27 years and get a LOT OF FABRIC from various fabric companies, I just don't have the time to prewash, dry, iron all the yardage. And, if some of it is prewashed and others are not, then I could have a shrinkage disaster on my hands.

Here's the block we are making using green and cream fabric. It is my 10" paper pieced Palm block.

10" paper pieced Palm block before trimming

Question #3 about how I double-fold my fabric: When I cut fabric from yardage that is 42/44" wide, I always first straighten it. That's what the lines on my ruler are for. I DO NOT use the lines on my mats for this. I look at the fold at the top and bottom and then check them against the lines on my ruler. Here is a cut I made from the TORN fabric. Now it's straight. Why do I have pins there? Because I'm not ready to cut my strips and I can hang this on a hanger and not worry about lining things up again. Pretty clever, huh?

Straightening my fabric

AND, every few cuts I open the fabric to check to be sure there are NO curves. Yesterday, one of the ladies was cutting with a single fold (ie, the fabric was 22" high). She didn't stop and check every few cuts and there were some serious curves on several of the strips. I feel I have more control over the fabric when it's folded twice. Just me.

Question #4: We ran out of that cream fabric and so I got into my car and went to the quilt shop for more. This is one of my VERY BIGGEST bugaboos! I asked for 3/4 yard. The lovely clerk measured and then, before I could say anything, SHE TORE IT! Yes, she did. SHE TORE IT! I gasped. She freaked. I told her I do not like tearing, but I tried to be kind. This was not a mortal sin; just a little blip on the radar screen in light of quilting eternity, right?

This is what tearing fabric does to it. This is some fabric from another vendor and the quilt shop TORE IT. Can you see the runs? Some of them are up to 1" wide. This is why I like my fabric CUT.

Torn fabric

OK. I think there are probably several more rules I like to break. I'll let you know with another post sometime.

Here's a lovely quilt I made with that TORN fabric above. It uses one of my Peacock Garden blocks from my last book. I can see edges of those tears in this quilt (not in the photo, but in real life).

Peacock Garden

Now I'll get down off my throne and get back to quilting. I'm pressing a LOT of seams open this afternoon (Friday) as I write this. And there are no Quilt Police lurking in my closet. I think sometime I will share some of my over 2 dozen quilt magazine cover quilts and point out the "flaws" in each one. I think you will be surprised - and somewhat relieved. For now, get back to having fun with your fabric!

Free Pattern Friday: Sonnet

How's your Friday going? We are waiting for the Snow Apocalypse to happen tomorrow here in Virginia, so how about taking our minds off of that with a Spring type pattern?

This is Sonnet which I designed for P and B Textiles almost 2 years ago. My favorite color is pink and it looks so lovely with these grays. What do you think?

Sonnet: 34" x 42"

Sonnet is composed of two sizes of blocks. The smaller blocks finish to 7-1/2" and the larger blocks finish to 15". I wanted the fabric to do all the work. I do not like to chop beautiful fabric into little, tiny pieces. This is a very quick quilt to stitch and makes a lovely size for a small child or even a lap quilt for a wheel chair.

Any combination of colors will do. Make it in fabrics you love.

Click the link and it will take you directly to the pdf of the pattern for easy download.

Windham Wednesdays with Fantasy and Uncorked

FIRST: I have my two winners: Aby B. of North Dakota won a hard copy CD of my book. Bonnie B. of Canada won the digital version. Congratulations! And thanks to all of you for your kind words about these quilts!

Now let's talk about some beautiful AND current fabrics. You saw a few of these images before, but I was able to quilt this a few weeks ago and plan on using the finishing steps (binding, rod pocket and label tricks) in an upcoming blog post.

I saw Fantasy back in the Fall of 2019. They were new at Quilt Market and a local shop owner brought some to my guild meeting here in Virginia. I immediately asked Windham (for whom I design and sew on occasion) for some. And this is the fat quarter bundle that came!

Fantasy fabrics by Windham

I already had the blenders called Uncorked by Another Point of View for Windham. (Doesn't that sound like a party theme?)

Uncorked fabrics and my trusty dresden ruler

I began playing with these two collections together in August (click the link to see what I mean). I used an assembly idea from a previous quilt for inspiration. Well, I should say that the assembly idea helped me out of my dilemma of not having enough fabric to make a "normal" quilt setting. I rather like the new look. I call this Disappearing Dresdens.

Disappearing Dresdens

The blocks are 20", but as you can see, I have one whole block and one block that cascades into the whole block. Just imagine the quilt center as three 10" squares by three 10" squares. Two of those squares using the Uncorked fabric are PLAIN with no dresden wedges. That's why I call this approach "descending." The blues and grays are from Uncorked.

Whole, typical Dresden Plate block (20" x 20"

Now, what if I twist one of the 10" units 180 degrees?

Rearranged Dresden Block

I used several Fantasy prints to finish with borders. How can you do this with only fat quarters?

Look again at the quilt:

Uncorked and Fantasy playing very nicely in my summer backyard

I split up the two borders in segments that I could cut from fat quarters. Review: a fat quarter is not what I have around my midriff. It's a cut of fabric that measures 18" x 21"!

I hope you have been inspired today by thinking outside the box when it comes to arranging your quilt blocks. Many of them can be "split" and then turned and twisted to create this descending arrangement. Just add some filler plain squares and even a little triangle in the corner of one unit (which, by the way, was not meant to be on that spot but I didn't notice until the quilt was done. Oh, well!)

Anatomy of a Quilt: Day 3 and GIVEAWAY!

I thought I would finish up the examples of my Anatomy of a Quilt terms by sharing the 16 quilts in my first book and referring to the parts in them.

I have my two winners: Aby B. of North Dakota won a hard copy CD of my book. Bonnie B. of Canada won the digital version. Congratulations! And thanks to all of you for your kind words about these quilts!

Bold, Black and Beautiful is the title of my first book (AQS, 2004). The common "thread" was the use of black in my quilts. I still own a few of these (most of the others were part of that theft in 2005). But, in this post, I just want to share ALL of them and inspire you to consider the use of black in your quilts.

1. The Cover Girl is Royal Star. She appeared on the cover of Quilt Magazine and also on this book. She glows full of Benartex Fossil Ferns! This is an updated version of a vintage block.

Royal Star

Here is my book cover:

The SASHINGS between the blocks are composed of 3 strips: black/color/black. Now that you know that trick, I think you can see that my blocks appear to float with those 9 Patch CORNERSTONES. The black of the blocks comes up against the black in the SASHINGS and so it creates an illusion!

2. Grandmother's Night Garden. Block Size: 14" x 20". Quilt Size: 49" x 61". I still have this one! This is NOT English Paper Pieced; I stitched those hexagons with y-seams! And then I appliquéd the large hexagon units to a black rectangle.

Grandmother's Night Garden

I have two different SASHING strips separating the rectangular blocks (see? a block doesn't have to be square). This is a very scrappy treatment with solid strips playing nice with the strips of squares. Notice also in the borders I have two different fabrics and in each corner is a Four Patch.

3. Jeweled Keepsake Hearts. Block Size: 8" x 8". Quilt Size: 32" x 42"
Floral sashing strips with black cornerstones. Technically, NO BORDER! I just carried the sashing strips to the outside edges. How do you like that pumpkin orange block background?

The BINDING is black. Works well with those black CORNERSTONES.

Jeweled Keepsake Hearts

4. The Talking Quilt (you saw this on Wednesday). Block Size: 7-1/2". Quilt Size: 45" x 52"
The squares are set on point for the BLOCKS.

Kids' Talking Quilt

5. Fair Play uses 10" blocks and finishes to 37" x 37". This is a modern rendition of a vintage block from the early 1900s. There is NO sashing. They are set block to block. Simple black print border. Green binding.

Fair Play

This is raw edge appliqué. This was a workshop for a few years. Here is my Asian inspired Fair Play. I spread those rings a little more freely in this one!

Asymmetrical Fair Play

6. 98 Bright Dancing Squares is also hanging on the Giant Quilt Rack in the Sky. She has sent me secret messages from time to time telling me to recreate her. And I did. These are raw edge appliqué blocks of 5", set block to block (no sashing) and two thin borders with the binding repeating the first border.

98 Bright Dancing Squares: 40" x 40"

I just discovered I made so many others with this pattern that I'm going to do a blog post about them soon! I thought I only had two others. Can you say 4?

7. Next is Velvet Stars. Also hanging in the Sky. Sigh. I really loved this quilt. I had a bundle of solid Kona type fabrics in the late 1990s and used them to make this very scrappy quilt. The inspiration came from a tattered velveteen pillow I found in a yard sale. Simple pieced blocks (12" x 12"). Simple sashing and corner stones. Simple borders and binding. The stars are the stars!

Velvet Stars: 48" x 62"

8. Autumn Tessellating Stars also has 12" blocks. It finishes to 58" x 58". The key to this is to use only two colors in the block, then when you place them block to block, you will see the tessellating (interlocking) stars!

Autumn Tessellating Stars

Here is what a single block looks like (in different fabrics). This is from my Block a Day calendar. Patricia Bryant of Australia made this!

Single Tessellating Star

9. Shotgun Wedding Ring (don't you just love that title!) is a cheater's shortcut approach to the traditional Double Wedding Ring. Appliquéd curved wedges on background squares. I've made this multiple times and I even did a blog post for Benartex with this (do a search on the right sidebar here and I'm sure you will find it).

Shotgun Wedding Ring

This is NOT A DIGITAL image! The background fabric is black. The rings are green and pink. The blocks are set with no sashing. Let me demonstrate:

These are the wedges with fusible webbing on the back, ready to be stitched down

And with FOUR blocks (black with tiny leaves), scattered my green wedges

Four 12" blocks

Some quilts are made from a single block. This is true in this Golden Mariner's Compass. Can you believe that I drafted this compass on a large coffee filter (a convenient circle) and then paper pieced it. Two borders (one inner, one outer) and it's done!

Autumn Mariner's Compass: 23" x 23"

Are you still with me? Just a few more!

11. Mini Grandma's Garden uses English Paper Pieced blocks. Brights with blacks. There are a few alternate blocks and squares. Very irregular assembly, but eye-catching.

Mini Grandma's Garden: 31" x 31"

The blocks are the Grandmother's Flower Garden hexie blocks (6" square). Then I arranged them in an irregular assembly (yes, I already said that) and filled in with squares and a few blocks. Simple borders. Done!

12. Butterflies at Night is a Dresden Plate block morphing into butterflies. These are 30 degree wedges. Machine appliquéd to the black background squares. Very similar colors to the one above, but I used sashing and corner stones. 10" blocks.

Butterflies at Night: 35" x 47"

13. Pink and Black Irish Chain was made to incorporate some machine embroidery. Can you see those butterflies? The alternating blocks are a 25 Patch (and finish to 4-1/2", if you can believe it?!)

Double Irish Chain

Two blocks, set block to block. NO sashing. The placement of the pink and black squares in the corners of the blocks give this the appearance of weaving. No inner border. Outer border and binding are the SAME fabric.

14. Diamond Bar, was made by an Atlanta friend Susie Gilroy. It looks a bit like the Double Irish Chain above. 6" blocks.

Diamond Bar: 66" x 66"

There are two blocks: 9 Patch and Rail Fence. They are set to block to block - no sashing. AND - they are set ON POINT with side and corner triangles. That extra set of triple sashing with the corner blocks (squares on point) take our eyes out even further. Love this quilt!

15. Colossal Chrysanthemums  is another Dresden Plate quilt. No sashing. Just blocks. And, after agonizing for at least a month on what to do about a border, my very savvy high school daughter said, "It doesn't need any, mom. It's done."Added that print binding that reflects the bright colors in those dresden wedges.

Colossal Chrysanthemums: 40" x 40"

And the last quilt (#16) is my Sweet Slice of Summer. Actually, it belongs to Diane Leighton of California. It's a replica of my earlier one done in white.

My Sweet Slice of Summer from 2002

And the one in the book with 6" blocks and pink sashing.

Sweet Slice of Summer by Diane Leighton

So, now you've seen the main parts of a quilt. Most of these quilts are fairly traditional. But you do have to say that there are a lot of bright colors! I also have a few more tips to share from the book (like my Ten Reasons to Cut and Sew a Sample Block . . .). That will be along soon.

Which is your favorite? I'd love to know. That's how you're entered into my GIVEAWAY: a copy of the CD of this book (USA residents only) or a digital copy for my International visitors. Make sure I have your email. Many visitors who comment come through as "no reply/anonymous" and I can't even send you an email! I will have TWO winners (USA and International)

Contest is over Monday, January 13 at midnight (EST).

The CD reads just like the original book. You can print the patterns as you wish. This is in pdf format.  I sell it for $10 and you can see all of these quilts on one page here: Bold, Black and Beautiful Quilts.