New Mini Quilts- Sweet Marie and Summer Blossoms

Hello again! I finished up two mini quilts this week (that were 98% finished already, why is that last push so hard?) and I'm excited to have checked them off and joined with their mini friends.

Pattern links top to bottom and left to right:

First Snow, Clambake, (swap mini, no pattern), Rise, 

Summer Blossoms, Butterfly, Star Kisses,  

Sweet Marie, Flower Garden, 

Woodland Wander, Arabesque, Plus Cross

The ones I just finished are Summer Blossoms Mini, and Sweet Marie Mini, both patterns in my shop. 

Summer Blossoms took a while because I decided to add the embroidery around the centers to make them look like zinnias, one of my very favorite flowers. I did the crosshatch machine quilting first, and then added the embroidery stitches, not worrying about the chicken scratch on the back since it's a mini quilt and will be staring at the wall for all it's days.

 The mini blocks are 7", half the size of the regular sized ones. I loved making both! Here's the original quilt with the larger blocks.

Next up is Sweet Marie Mini. The first time I made this pattern was for Quilting in the Rain's Quilt Market booth over a year ago. I ended up selling that one for charity to donate money to the Puerto Rico hurricane victims. Funny thing- the person who bought it and donated the money was Jera Brandvig, the designer of the fabric :) She has it framed in her house! I'm so honored, her house is gorgeous.

I also made a pillow to go with it, using the block pattern from the regular sized Sweet Marie quilt. 

These mini blocks are also half size at 6", a great size to add sampler or Farmer's Wife quilts. I've got one in my 6" sampler that I'm so close to finishing! I think I only need 5 more blocks!

Here's the original Sweet Marie quilt for reference. I made the crib size, but it also comes with instructions for a throw size.

This is the fabric pull I started with for the Sweet Marie Mini. I ended up adding some fussy cuts to the tiny little squares. These are mostly Tasha Noel, Bonnie and Camille, varying lines, and a few basics and blenders from other favorite designers like Sedef Imer, Vanessa Goertzen, and Elea Lutz. 

It's nice to check those off! To celebrate I'm having a mini quilt sale, as well as a discount on the larger size of these two patterns. Minis are marked down already to $5, and large quilts to $7, no code needed!

Rainbow Remix Quilts Tutorial

Today we are talking rainbow quilts! I find such satisfaction in sewing colors into rainbow order. I've started a little tradition of making rainbow baby quilts for charity, you can see some of them here.

Remember last year when I made this twin sized simple striped rainbow quilt using soft muted colors? There's a free pattern for it if you missed it! Fabric Bubb still has color bundles too.

It was such a fun project that I wanted to do something like that again, but with a brighter rainbow this time. Because I need two baby girl gifts right now, I took the same cuts, and instead of a twin sized quilt like I did with the muted colors, I created two smaller quilts and a pillow. The quilts are a generous crib size at about 42" x 56".

Before I share how, let me say that Stash Fabrics is carrying kits for the bright version, as well as the muted colors.

Bright Rainbow Kit

Muted Rainbow Kit

They will also be giving a kit away on Instagram for one of their #workingmystashoff February participants!

You could use either bundle for either project (the twin sized quilt or the trio of smaller projects).

Alright, on to the trio of small projects.

You start with 14 quarter yards.

Cut each color quarter yard into:
(1) 4.5" x WOF strip (for the simple rainbow quilt)
(1) 3.5" x WOF strip (for the sashed rainbow quilt)

Now, if your cuts are very straight and a bit generous, you can cut the remainder to:
(1) 1.5" x WOF, subcut to (2) 20" x 1.5" cuts of each color (for the pillow)

I got mine all from Fabric Bubb or Merrily We Quilt Along, and I had no problem with the last cut. If you don't think your cuts are going to be straight enough to be sufficient, and you definitely want to make the pillow, you'll have to forego one of the crib quilts. You could make several pillows in that case!

From 3/4 yd white fabric for the sashed quilt, cut:
(13) 1.75" x WOF

For backing and binding you'll need:
1 1/2 yds backing for each quilt
1/3 yd binding fabric for each quilt
20" square backing for the pillow

Now I will describe the process for each individually.

Simple Rainbow Baby Quilt (approx. 42" x 55")

Sew your (14) 4.5" x WOF strips together in rainbow order with a 1/4" seam. If you use the bundle that I did, some of them come from different manufacturers and therefore won't all be the exact same width of fabric. That's ok! When you're finished sewing them all together, press seams either to one side or open, it doesn't matter. I pressed to one side.

To trim up the sides, fold your pressed top in half right sides together, parallel with the stripes, and line up the top and bottom edges.

Fold in half again, the same direction. It will look something like this:

Now line up the bottom fold with a line on your cutting mat, and using the perpendicular lines on the mat, trim both sides of the quilt top. When you unfold it you should have perfectly straight edges if you've sewn and folded carefully.

Baste, quilt, and and bind as desired. For this one I did simple straight lines on my Juki TL 2010Q. It quilts so fast! I started by quilting 1/4" on either side of the seams, and then added two rows of quilting within each color. At first I used my Hera Marker to mark the lines, but ended up giving up on that and eyeballing the rest. That's pretty much a metaphor for my whole life right now, ha!

I backed this one in a gorgeous floral from Sunnyside Up by Corey Yoder for Moda. I used a Bonnie and Camille Smitten aqua dot for the binding.

Sashed Rainbow Baby Quilt (approx. 42" x 57")

Sew a 1.75" x WOF white sashing strip to the bottom of every 3.5" x WOF color, except the very bottom one. Press away from the sashing. Now sew those pieces in rainbow order. Like the simple striped quilt, you will probably have different widths of fabric, and that's ok. Trim in the same way described above.

Finish the quilt as described above. On this one I used the automated squiggle stitch on my Husqvarna Viking. I used Swiss dots in multiple different colors on white for the sashing, grey Swiss dots on the back, and aqua dots for the binding.

Striped Pillow

Choose (18) 1.5" x 20" strips that you want to use for your rainbow. You'll need duplicates of 4 of the colors, but you can start and end your rainbow wherever you want. I started with the hot pink (second color in the quilt) which meant I ended with the lightest peach.

Sew all the strips together in order. Baste to batting and quilt as desired. I did a simple hand quilted running stitch with white friendship bracelet thread. You can buy a big bag of lots of colors very inexpensively. These ones I really did want to be quite straight so I marked the line with a disappearing pen and then stitched along it. You can read this more detailed hand quilting tutorial if you need to. Trim to 18" square.

Finish the pillow with a backing and zipper closure. I have a zipper tutorial video for pillows on my Instagram highlights. It's not professional by any means, I've got a long way to go in the video department! But you'll get the idea for sure. There is also a step by step photo tutorial in this post.

I always buy pillow forms at IKEA because they feel great and are inexpensive. The 20" down forms are perfect for 18" covers, you want your cover to be a bit smaller than the form for the perfect squishiness.

I backed mine in the same Sunnyside Up print, but on aqua instead of white.

Finally, here are the colors I used. I was finicky about the shades and ended up using things from different manufacturers, unlike the muted, which are all from Kona. Here are the brights:

Free Spirit Sapphire 
Moda Bella Regatta 
Kona Jade Green 
Tula Aegean 
Free Spirit Julep 
Free Spirit Cricket 
Free Spirit Pear 
Tula Limeade 
Kona Grellow 
Free Spirit Persimmon 
Tula Hibiscus 
Kona Punch 
Moda Bella Shocking Pink 
Kona Cerise

The dots in the sashed quilt are all Riley Blake Swiss Dots in nearly every color on white. I didn't use red, black, or navy, but I used pretty much all the others, which are just in my stash.

Alright, I think that covers it! Please let me know if I've overlooked any details in the comments, I haven't been sleeping much lately!

Moda Love Quilt Along and Coloring Page

You've probably heard of the Moda Love quilt pattern. It's a classic! You can find the free PDF pattern for it here, and Moda is hosting a fun sew along for it right now called Moda LOVEin'. You can check out the Instagram hashtag to see some examples, there are lots of pretties there. Here are some of my favorites.

This beauty is a mix of Lella Boutique fabrics and was made by Karinda of @kmrainwater. I adore it.

The fun thing about this pattern is that it can be made using either a Layer Cake for a throw sized quilt, a Charm Pack for a baby quilt, or a Mini Charm Pack for a 12" block. The pattern includes instructions for all three. This is a throw size in Fig Tree fabrics by Joanna herself during the blog tour kickoff for the pattern.



Many people have put the fabric in color order, which always turns out pretty. I love this one by Whitney of @southernmakings. She did hers in Vintage Picnic by Bonnie and Camille, one of my very favorite fabric lines!

It's very striking in just two fabrics as well, like this clever little thing by Jessica @sawitloveditmadeit.

I'm thinking it would be fun to use this chambray dot as a background with different values of red.

Since I wanted to explore options for this quilt, I made a blank block that I could print out. I thought I'd share it here in case anyone else is wanting to plan theirs out.

Click here to print the coloring page. 

I can't wait to see what beauties are made during the sew along!

I'll be back shortly with the promised rainbow quilts tutorial, as soon as my foot feels better from dropping an Instant Pot on it (ouch) and the sun comes out for pictures! Hoping for Saturday. See you soon!

Christmas Medallion Quilt- Bambino Pattern

Hello! Merry December! I'm happy to have finished another Christmas quilt- this time the throw size of my Bambino pattern. I've put it on sale to celebrate!

(If you're wondering about that pillow, you can read about it here- Crochet Trim Pillow.)

I don't know why my photos are uploading blurry today, but I'm going to ignore it and carry on!

This pattern is designed to use precuts for the "dot" or snowball border- 3.5" Treats for the baby size, and 5" Charms for the throw size. Now before you ask what line I used for mine- I didn't! I love to make my own fabric combinations and I cut this custom Christmas charm pack a couple of years ago from my stash. I promise it will be cute in any Christmas line though! Or, you can cut your own favorites like me :)

I used Moda Crossweave in Black for the background and I always love the texture and contrast that provides. The binding is from Bonnie and Camille's Handmade line a few years back, and the backing is their new shiny silver dots from the Vintage Christmas line.

I loved making this quilt because I never got bored- each new layer makes it fun and exciting! Plus, Christmas quilts are always my happy place.

This one comes out to 63" square, a nice little throw size. You'd better believe we are using ours this weekend for Christmas movie night! The baby size is 42" square. You can see my baby one here, or check out some that other people have made. It doesn't have to be a Christmas quilt by any means, and I think it's especially cute for little boys.

The quilting was done by Emilee Hathaway. I'm not sure the name of the pattern, but I picked it because it sort of looks like Christmas lights on a strand. Right?

Grab the pattern while it's on sale for the next few days, and merry Christmas sewing!