Extra Fabric on The Frame?

I just finished a quilt for a customer (will show that in another post when I roll the frame back).  My customers typically don't get the extra fabric back u less they ask for it or unless it is a lot.  So what do I do with that extra fabric?

Put some mug rugs on.  :). I have a cute quilt that I'm working on and had an extra Dresden plate so I made four mug rugs, each quilted differently.  

These can be sold for a little extra dollars, giving to charity, given as a gift to a sick loved one or given as a gift to a friend.

Just a little something fun to share.

Happy Quilting,

Rhonda

Progress on Custom Sampler Quilt

I am so impressed with my way my little quilt is coming along.  I have completed one color thread pass and am on my second.  Want a sneak peak?

I have gone straight line and cross hatch crazy with the help of Quilter's Groove Proline rulers.  I will be featuring these at a great introductory price at my web store real soon!  They are amazing!

Converting Your Favorite Pattern to Work With Your AccuQuilt GO!

Since becoming an AccuQuilt Retailer I have been trying to find every way possible to use my machine.  Some times it's easy to look at a pattern and say "yep, I can do that" and other times it might take a little thinking or adjusting in pattern size but it is still easy and can be done.

In the July/August 2013 issue of McCall's Quilting Magazine, there is a beautiful quilt made with Dresden plates on the cover and on page 42 called "Miss Kyra".  The quilt was designed by Erin Russek and you will need to purchase the magazine for complete details and directions.  I am only going to point out the parts that I had to convert or change to use the AccuQuilt GO!

The first step for me since I am using to GO! is to cut my Dresden Plates (55071).  The pattern calls for 100 but I know it takes 21 to make a full circle with the GO! Die and I have five for the quilt top so I will cut a 105 plus 5 centers.  (Guess what, that took me a whole 30 minutes, including getting out my fabric and rotary cutting into 6" strips to minimize waste.)

The GO! Dresden are larger than the one in the original pattern so I need to decide which is easier (or which I want to do), I can either make the Dresden's smaller simply by stitching a line 3.75" (4" template) from the bottom or I can make the overall project a little larger using the 5.5" Dresden as-is.  I have to stitch the line either way and I have to trim at the point so that it will not bulk.  Either way will work great, the only extra step will be if I choose to use the smaller size, when I trim the point, I will also trim off the excess leaving .25" seam allowance.

(If you are going with the original pattern design, you will need to make a line on the bed of your machine to align the edge by as you stitch.  In my case it aligned with the edge of the plate perfectly just by moving my needle to the right.)

I think I am going to use the plates as is because I am perfectly ok with the finished quilt being about 8" - 10" larger overall.  

So now I have finished my five Dresden Plates as directed on the AccuQuilt directions.  Oh my goodness, they went together so nice and with a good 1/4" seam allowance are laying as flat as a pancake.  

Now the the Dresden's are complete, we need to figure out the size of our background block.  Our GO! Dresden is approximately 11.5" which is roughly 1" bigger than the original pattern.  With that being said, I am going to add 1" on all sides making my back ground piece 2" larger than the pattern.  I can always trim them down later if I want to. So we need to cut five of those, plus two more for the half square triangles.  I needed to cut one, 33" background to use for the quarter square triangles.  (Notice I have myself some extra fabric here.  This will allow me to trim and square up nicely.  The $4 in fabric that will be added to my scrap bucket will more than pay off in the time I saved.  You can also measure and be more precise if you want to and eliminate that scrap bucket addition.)

At this point, I will start assembling the center of the top as directed in the magazine.  I will add the small border  then the appliqué flowers... Oh AccuQuilt has so many to choose from.  :)

I have decided to use the GO! Round Flower Die (55007).  No reason other than similar size and I had it handy.  You could use just about any flower die you choose.

I always iron my fusible backing to my fabric before cutting on the GO!.  (My preference is Steam-A-Seam 2 Lite). This is again a huge time saver.

I added the flowers and outside order according to the directions on the pattern and finished at 65" x 65".

This is the unquilted version and I think it turned out great.  

This is just one of many examples of taking your favorite magazine or pattern and using your GO!  I can't tell you how quickly this all came together.  The AccuQuilt GO! System truly does help us all make better cuts, that make better quilts.

Custom Quilt Design

So I made this beautiful quilt top using the 12" AccuQuilt Mix N Match dies.  The original purpose for making this is to have a sample display quilt for my booth.

I chose to use the bright colors similar to what AccuQuilt using on their samples in order to draw attention to it.

After the top was finished, then comes how to quilt it.  I have watched some of Lisa Calle's videos on QnnTV.com and how she designs custom quilting patterns and so off I went.  This quilt now becomes a dual purpose... AccuQuilt Display and custom quilt sampler.  Now where to start...

Lets take the second block and I'll show you what I did.

Here is the actual block with actual colors.  

I then printed out a copy (or you can print a picture) in black n white so the colors didn't distract me from the design process.  

Using a piece of tracing paper laid on top of the printed design, I was able to do my outline or stitch in the ditch and then fill in each section from there.  Knowing what I know now, I should have done this first page in about four or five pages displaying a different step on each page.

After looking at the above picture, I still had some area that I wanted to add detail to.  So here comes another piece of tracing paper...

The purpose of using multiple pieces of tracing paper is to make changes easily without starting all over.  If I decided the feathers were to much, I would just remove those pages and go back to filling in the blanks on a new page.

So this is where I'm at today.  I will post as I start to actually quilt the blocks and share with you a great new ruler that Lisa designed that I am adding to my store.