Monday, April 23, 2012

Things to Remember when sewing a Minkee back

When I 'enveloped' the quilt top to the Minkee back I discovered that sewing on a Minkee back is a little trickier than one might think. The secret is to PIN IT a LOT!

I had to take out two of the side seams with the first Minkee back quilt (Bazoople Patchwork), as it tends to stretch when you sew it and it was puckered when I went to sew the 4th side. After seam ripping 2 or the 3 sides that I had just sewn, I had to unpin the whole thing, smooth the quilt top and the Minkee again, re-pin everything and start over with sewing the side seams.

Don't make the mistake of trimming the excess Minkee off too soon!  I had difficulty lining it up again... :(

The second Minkee back quilt I made a week later (Blazing Star Baby), I pinned twice as much, left a large edge of Minkee sticking out and then carefully sewed one seam edge at a time. I kept checking the Minkee back, re-pinning and re-smoothing as needed.
Then I sewed the second side, repeated the smoothing/ pinning process and by the time I did the 3rd and 4th side seams it was almost perfect. :)




This little baby quilt does not have batting in the middle. It is intended to be a light summer quilt.
The next one I make I think I will put light batting in between the pieced top and the minkee back. I wonder if the batting will help to hold the Minkee better? 

After that I chose a quilt stitch from the many choices on my janome (Memory Craft 7700- I LOVE this machine!) and just sewed the seam lines between the blocks. After that I chose a different stitch and went around the outside of the yellow border. At the end, I sewed a scant 1/4 inch seam around the edge of the whole quilt.
Then I was done!
I always love that moment when you lift the quilt out of the machine and admire the finished product! :)

Happy Quilting!

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Blazing Star Bazoople Baby

I finished the quilt top for T's baby quilt today. I call it the "Blazing Star Bazoople Baby" quilt.  I quite like how it turned out.  :)

This is my own pattern idea. I saw these star blocks in another pattern and used those directions to help my make these blocks, (although I didn't make the actual quilt itself which was a wedding quilt with 2 other kinds of blocks in it as well.)

 The look of a quilt top really changes from when the blocks are sewn together...


Friendship star blocks and Fussy cut Bazoople Animal blocks



To when a border is added around them...

Inner border has been added


To when the final border is added!

Outer border has been added

At first I had planned to just make this with the yellow dot border around it,  but I thought it looked too 'feminine'... and since this quilt is for a baby boy, I decided to tone the yellow down...

I added a 3 inch outer border, which minimizes the yellow, turning it into a 1 1/4 inch inner border.



Now I just need to put the blue/grey minkee fleece on the back and quilt it. :)  

The finished quilt top is 38" by 46" inches, but there will be 1/2 inch seams when adding the minkee fleece back to it, so the completed quilt will be: 37" X 45".

These star blocks are actually called "Friendship stars". The blocks are 8 inches square with seam allowance/ (7 1/2 inch blocks once they are sewn together...)

I like this "Friendship Block" quilt a lot and since I have quite a bit of the same fabric left, I am going to make some more star blocks, a few more fussy-cut bazoople animal blocks, and maybe make a few pinwheel blocks or something as well, arrange them all a bit differently and see what I come up with...
I love the creativity of quilting!  :)




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