Table Runners

 Happy Monday. We had a busy weekend with our Spring Clearance Sale. Thank you to everyone who came out, endured the lines, and did some shopping. With your help were able to empty 100's of bolts to make room for new fabrics!

Today I want to talk to you about Table Runners. I love making Table Runners. They are usually a pretty quick project and I love changing the one on my dining table with each season and holiday. I have several different summer themed runners, a few spring ones, Valentines Day, Christmas, winter, and fall.

Table Runners are usually quite inexpensive to make and don't require a lot of fabric. Often they can be made with fabric already in your stash or scrap bins. I love buying a Charm Pack of a new collection and making a runner, that way I get to play with a new fabric collection but don't have to make a big quilt each time. 

At the shop we have several different Table Runner Pattern Books, each one contains a wide variety of patterns. 

The Little Charmer Patterns are written for 5" squares and most just need a little extra background fabric and a binding and a backing to make. Each of these patterns has 3 different patterns making them a great budget friendly choice. 

I am going to be making up a runner using Little Charmers 5 and a Happy Days Charm Pack. I think it will be so bright and cheery when it is finished. The Happy Days yardage should be in the shop this week and than we will put some kits together as well. 

Another option for Table Runner patterns, is quilt patterns. Some Quilt Patterns include a Table Runner option but for those that don't I will often take just make a few of the blocks or one row and turn it into a Table Runner instead of a quilt. 

Memi's Lemons is one example. I love this pattern but really don't need a Lemon Quilt so I will just make the Table runner option and have a really fun summer runner. We will have kits ready for this one in just a couple weeks, the pattern is being shipped to us now. 

Table Runners are a great way to try out a new technique, Memi's Lemons which I just mentioned has some curved piecing. Starting out with just a runner is a lot less daunting than making a whole quilt and if it doesn't go well it was just a little investment of time and money rather than what a full quilt would have been. 

I love giving Table Runners as gifts. They are such a nice way to let someone know you are thinking of them, especially now when restrictions are leaving a lot of people feeling really lonely. Esther made a several for some of the older members of our Church last summer and they were all so happy to receive one. 

Do you like making Table Runners and changing yours out with each season?

Carrie will be here on Thursday with the next block in her Garden Sampler BOM. 

Have a great week,

Kayla

Favorite Products: September

 It is time again to share some of our favorite products that we have been using lately. 

This past month Esther has been loving her Folded Corner Clipper Ruler from Creative Grids and her wool pressing mat. Her last two quilt projects both had a ton of Flip and Stitch Corners, and the Folded Corner Clipper was a great time saver as it eliminated the need to draw lines on the back side of 100s of squares, and the Wool Pressing Mat helped to get all those seams laying nice and flat.

       

I have been working on a few projects that contain a lot of small pieces that are similar in size to each other and the Alphabitties and WonderClips have been a great help in staying organized. Even if your pattern does not have letters assigned to each cut you can pencil them in beside and it will save time measuring each piece while sewing to be sure you have the correct one. 

Carrie is really liking a new to our shop pattern designer... Lo and Behold Stitchery. Brittany  has many fun modern quilt patterns that you can put together with different fabrics and get a completely different look each time. Also the cover photos of her patterns are all done in solids so it makes them easy to replicate if you love the look, and easier to picture in your mind in different fabrics. We have many of her patterns in stock in our shop and there are also free coloring pages on her website for several of her patterns, which helps with color layout and putting the quilt top together. Brittany is also vary active on Instagram so visit her account @loandbeholdstitchery for some inspiration. 

 

Carrie is back again on Thursday with the next block in her Midnight Clear Block of The Month.

Have a great week,

Kayla

Panel Patterns

It has been so warm this week. I love the heat and the sun so I am thrilled, we have been spending a lot of time at my parents lake swimming and water skiing. Even though I love the heat I am so thankful for my air conditioning in our house!

This past Tuesday we did a Facebook Live Video on Panels and how to use them in various projects. 

I will share with you tonight some of our favorite quilt patterns for patterns, and what to use panels for besides for in a quilt. 

Panels have come a long way in the past few years. They used to be about 20" wide by the width of fabric, and their wasn't a lot of patterns designed for panels. Now they come in a wide variety of sizes, any where from small individual blocks, to 54"x60" which is large enough to be a lap quilt. And there is so much pattern support, from fun coordinating prints, to a wide variety of patterns written specifically for panels. 

Mountain Peak Creations is one of our favorite designers for panels. There patterns are fun and add some fun elements to dress up a simple pattern. They provide options to make quilts from narrow panels, with out making them look like an odd shape. Some of their patterns are written for a variety of different sized panels which is great because there is not necessarily a standard size anymore. They also have patterns for horizontal panels which are starting to become really popular too! The patterns are well written and easy to follow. 

Castilleja Cotton is another of our favorite pattern designers to use for panels. They are based in Calgary. A good selection of their patterns are written for the Hoffman Call Of The Wild prints, and we have made kits for several of them, and they always sell out so quick. 

One Block Wonder Quilts are fun to make and use 6 or 7 of the same panel. Each and everyone turns out so different. The one pictured below is one Esther did last summer, she has another one in progress, but it is set aside at the moment for other more pressing projects.

For those panels that are printed as blocks, we often put them in our quilts in place of blocks. So if our panel blocks measure 12" we will make a bunch of 12" blocks and mix the panels into the layout. 

Now if you feel you have enough quilts panels can work really great for a few other things. 

They work great as door decor, rather than hanging a wreath, just hang a panel that you have quilted, on the wreath hooks instead. We always add 2 loops onto the back when we sew on our binding to hang them. It is fun to switch them out for each season. I know several people that made them as gifts for relatives or friends that were in senior centers or longer term care facilities, it adds some cheer to the door and doesn't take up any extra space in the room.  

You could also hang them on a wall in your home this way to, or quilt a larger baby panel as is and gift it as a baby play mat. 

Some panels are great to make tote bags from. Esther used a Sweetwater Panel to make this fun tote bag, and just adjusted the measurements in the pattern to fit her panel. Tote bags are generally pretty straight forward to adjust, especially if the lining is cut the exact same as the exterior. 

Do you use panels at all? We have over 200 panels listed on our online shop, which you can view here and more than that in store, so come on in to check them out. We recently hung new rods to display our panels and now have a good selection hanging there for you to see. 

Have a great weekend,

Kayla

Favorite Patterns

MXLLS​​ Do you have a favorite quilt pattern? One that you pull out of your pattern box over and over, maybe its even so tattered that you can hardly read it anymore, but it doesn't matter because you could probably make the quilt in your sleep. 

Yellow Brick Road is one of Esther's go to patterns. And hers really is getting worn out. But it is a good one. In fact it is one of the top sellers from our supplier and it is 17 years old. The pattern has 6 sizes from baby to a king. It is also fat quarter friendly, so shopping for it is quite simple. This quilt is perfect as a quick baby gift, a lap quilt for a friend or family member or any size bed quilt.

 

MLXLS​​

Carrie loves to sew the jelly roll race quilt, and has done several for friends and store samples. This quilt goes together really quick and makes a nice size lap quilt. 

 A popular quilt in our store is the Tumbler.  We cannot keep these kits in stock, they are popular in baby and lap size. 

I for one do not have a go to pattern. In fact I don't think that I have ever made the same quilt twice. 

Kayla