One Piece at a Time

Perfect Stems GIVE-AWAY

I have one of these packets of perfect stems to give away today.

To enter just leave a comment telling us if you watched THE WEDDING or not. I am planning on watching the re-run since I would have to have gotten up at 2am to watch real time...I have my limits you know....even when it comes to royal weddings.

AND...if you are being very ambitious...tell us you Royal Wedding Guest name: Here are the rules via the lovely Amy and facebook

What's your Royal Wedding Guest Name? Start w/ either Lord or Lady. Your first name is 1 of your grandparents' names. Your surname is the name of your 1st pet, double-barreled with the name of the Street you grew up on.

Mine is "Lady Kathleen Mopsie-Gledhill".

Please don't give away any password hints (that's from my 16 year old son)

Beautiful Baskets Part 2

Now that you have you basket all beautifully woven It’s time to add the handle and top and bottom. All these pieces are made from the two ½” bias strips I made from the basket material.

To make the bottom I cut a strip long enough to cover all the bottom vertical pieces PLUS enough to tuck in ¼” on each side. I then placed these over strips and glued them down.

To make the handle I used one long ½ bias strip and glued it along the line I traced from the pattern. Since this strip is thick I did two separate lines of glue to secure it. Once it was glued I trimmed the excess fabric from the handle.

The next step was to use the last piece of ½” bias stem to cover the tops of the basket’s vertical strips.

To secure the basket, I first appliquéd the basket sides down along the end vertical pieces. I slip stitched the outside and the inside of these end pieces.

The bottom of the basket can then be appliquéd down.

For the top, I first appliquéd the handle then the basket top.

I found that this was secure enough to hold it while I appliquéd the other flowers on. The strips move around a little but nothing that would cause any problems since they are packed in fairly tight. If you find the strips moving too much while you do any other appliqué you might want to sew more of the strips down.

Check back tomorrow for a chance to win some Perfect Stems from Karen Kay Buckley!

Beautiful Baskets Part 1

Several years ago I picked up a pattern from a local Colorado quilt pattern company called Curiosity. If you want to see some really lovely patterns check them out, as far as I can tell they are still in business. They had the most beautiful appliqué patterns, many of them done with baskets. They have some nice directions for weaving fabric baskets that can be found here. I was really afraid to try this until a few weeks ago because I thought it would be hard. Boy was I wrong. It’s very simple and really really fun. This method for baskets can be adapted to just about any basket you find on an appliqué pattern.

For the basket in my Miss Betty pattern I used ½ yard of fabric. From this I cut and made 10 bias stems, ¼” wide and two bias stems ½” wide. After making these I traced JUST the pattern for the basket onto my background fabric.

Next, place your background onto some suitable pinning surface. Start at one side of the basket drawing and pin a strip along the edge.

 Continue pinning at regular intervals until you have all the vertical strips done.

Now using the remaining strips and starting at the bottom, weave a strip in and out of the vertical stems as shown. Weave each strip in the opposite way as the previous strip to get that basket look.

After you have done a few of these, tuck the strips down so that they are packed fairly tight.

When you have woven most of the horizontal strips, cut the ends so they can be easily tucked under the side vertical strip.

Using the fabric glue of choice, secure these ends. Repeat on the other side.

As you can see here, I wove most of the basket and glue basted it. I then did the final horizontal strips and secured these. Finally, when all the weaving was done, I secured the vertical strips with some fabric glue. I didn’t bother to tuck these since they will be covered with the basket top and bottom.

Come back tomorrow to see how it was all finished!

Basket Making Supplies etc

Before we get started on making baskets I wanted to show you some products that will make this job loads easier.

First off, I found that these baskets are easier to construct using bias stems made with bias bars. I wrote a little tutorial about this last year and you can find it here and a video here. All the small basket pieces are ¼” bias stems.

The basket handles, top and bottom are made with ½” wide bias stems.

I have made stems using both the Clover bias maker and the bias bar method. Although I like each method I find that I use my bias bars more. I like the little bit of dimensionality these stems give. For making baskets, these stems are easier to work with because they are sewn on the back side and this will make weaving much easier.

As you can see I have quite an assortment of bias bars here.

Recently, I was looking for some to give-away on my blog (wink wink) and found that the metal ones were pretty pricey. To get a set that had 1/8” to ¾” was upwards of $20. The yellow plastic ones are OK but they are a tad thick and I find I don’t get as nice a result. A good alternative are Perfect Stems by Karen Kay Buckley.

They are made of durable plastic and come in various sizes all for $6. She has included some great instructions as well.

Another thing that will be needed is something to bin your basket strips to while you are weaving. I have this nice blocking board and it worked perfectly. A piece of foam core board from your local hobby store will also work just fine.

And, as always, I couldn’t have done this without my favorite favorite glue for basting.

At The Printers

Just letting you know that the Miss Betty patterns are at the printers and are available to order in my shop. Next week I will have a give-away for one of these. If you order one before then, enter the contest anyway and if you win I will refund you with my mad digital skilz!

 

The WINNER Is

LeAnne, who wrote

"Bunny ears are great, but my favorite food for Easter is hot cross buns. I never make them any other time of year so they're a real treat."

Thanks for playing along!

LeAnne...could you please e-mail me from the link on the left side of the blog so I can get this pattern to you...Thanks

Design Wall Monday

I hope everyone had a lovely holiday weekend. I am happy to report that the Easter Bunny (aka Aunt Betty) delivered a yummy Easter Basket on my front door step. The bunnies ears are gone...hmmm...I wonder who ate those? I thought you might enjoy this cartoon along this subject line...

I'm just putting the finishing touches on this basket quilt so I can put it in my shop. I'm calling it Miss Betty after my Aunt the Easter Bunny. It was tons of fun to make and I can't wait to share some new techniques with you.

This week I will have tutorials on how I made the basket and next week I plan on doing some tutorials on how I made that scallop border.

Head on over to Judy's blog and see what everyone else is up to.

Introducing Miss Belle

A few weeks ago when I was searching for names for Miss Sophie, blog reader Michelle suggested the name Miss Belle (her very sweet daughter's name). And I thought,

I LOVE that name!

So here is my new pattern, Miss Belle. This might look slightly familiar to folks, because it's the center from Ambrosia done with a funky border. So, if you already have Ambrosia I also have the border pattern as a download available in my shop. This is a super cute little project that looks kinda like an...Easter Egg from See's candy (some of which I am secretly hoping show up on my doorstep via Aunt Betty aka the Easter Bunny)

So, in honor of Easter I'm giving one of these away. To enter leave a comment telling us if you are hopelessly addicted to bunny ears as well and if not what is you favorite holiday food for this time of year.

Have a blessed and happy Easter everyone!

This is Brilliant!

 

Some of you might remember this post from last year…the one where I confessed to my love of eating the ears of chocolate Easter Bunnies…well today I found this

at the store...sigh

 

Basting a Complicated Block

I’ve had some questions lately about how I handle my stems and other overlapping elements when I baste and sew my blocks. I thought the best way to do this was to just show you how I put together a block for sewing.

First, I make all my leaves, stems, flowers and in this case birds. The flowers and birds are pre-assembled so they move as one piece. This is really helpful since I don’t want to be continually realigning the birds feathers etc. After they are all made I lay them out close to how they will go on the block.

I center and pin the pattern to the back of my background fabric.

I can see the design through the fabric, if I am using a dark background I use a light box. The first step is to glue the stems.

 

Then I do the leaves.

Then I do the first set of flowers. At this point I check to see if the leaf and stem fabric is showing through the flowers. If it is, I carefully trim it so it stays under the flower but doesn’t show through.

Next I do the second set of flowers and check for dark fabric shadowing through.

Finally, the birds and one final check for shadowing.

Hope that helps.