Wednesday, October 21, 2015

October Free Pattern-Twas the Night Runner

Twas the Night Photo
T’was the Night featuring Urban Scandinavian from P&B Textiles
46” x 22”
Designed by Heidi Pridemore
Christmas is coming! This month’s FREE pattern is a beautiful table runner, perfect for your holiday table. I designed this runner using the AccuQuilt Go! Big Electric Fabric Cutter and Urban Scandinavian fabric from P&B Textiles.
We are also excited to do our first FREE give-away this month. P&B Textiles was so kind to make us a fabric kit for this project and one lucky reader will win! Just leave a comment about your favorite holiday decoration (any holiday) on our blog, making sure in include your email address and I will draw the winner on 11/1/15.
This month’s featured dies are the Go! Reindeer (55353) and Go! Sleigh and Snowflakes (55322) . The applique dies makes this project so quick and easy, perfect if you are a last minute sewer like me. The elegant designs of these applique dies worked so well with the Urban Scandinavian Collection from P&B Textiles to make a modern and elegant runner.
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I also used the Half-Square Triangles (55063) to cut the pieced inner border. See our free pattern for other optional dies for cutting the outer borders.
The pattern for T’was the Night runner is now available at our website for download here.  The pattern will have all instructions to make this lovely quilt. We also have included the instructions for quilters who do not have a GO! Big Electric Fabric Cutter yet.
This month’s Blog is about finishing the applique shapes with a blanket stitch or Machine Applique.
First, following the free pattern, prepare, cut and press the shapes onto the listed backgrounds. Since the dies on this project have complex edges, I thought that this would be a good time to go over finishing the raw edges of each shape. So I made a video on how to finish the edges that you can check out here . I also included some tips below for you to check out.
Open Toe Foot
First I highly recommend using an open toe foot on your machine whenever you are doing a  decorative stitch on an edge of fabric. This allows you to see what you are doing while stitching. I  cannot stress how much this will help you when you are doing a blanket stitch on a piece. I have  done 100’s of quilts and I still struggle with this stitch when I have to use someone else’s machine  and they do not have an open toe foot for it. Here is what the foot should look like along with an  example of the stitching with it.
Blankstitch Closeup
My second tip is to adjust the stitch length and width to fit the shape you are stitching. Most of the time, I use the stitch setting that are preprogramed in the machine but if I am doing a small piece such as the snowflake on this project, I adjust the stitch to fit the shape. I also will do this throughout the project. I keep the stitch size the same on each shape but if the project dictates it, I will vary the stitch sizes throughout the project. On this project I used a smaller stitch on the snowflakes and regular stitch for the sled and reindeer.Stitched Pieces
For my last tip, is practice. Unless you are like me and have to do this stitch every week, you will need to warm up and practice before doing it on your final project. I recommend using scrap material to make up some sample pieces to work on first. The best shapes to use are stars and hearts. They have points and curves to practice on. Machine applique is a lot like machine quilting. You will need to warm up before starting and remember to relax while stitching.
Heart Sample
Please make sure to check out our video on this finishing stitch for more tips on Machine Applqiue.
By using the Go! Dies to make this runner, I saved time and the shapes came out perfectly. Oh how I loved not having to cut each shape for the project and it allowed me to move on to the fun part of the project, sewing of course.
I hope you have fun making our runner for the upcoming holidays. As always I would love to see photos of your finished projects. Also remember to leave you comments on our Blog post http://heidipridemore.blogspot.com/ to be entered into our giveaway.
Make sure to visit my blog each month where I will share with you some tips and tricks on cutting and assembling of the project of the month along with posting the free pattern on our website www.TheWhimsicalWorkshop.com You can also see our pattern and post at www.pbtex.com and www.accuquilt.com


Until next time…..
Heidi

Please visit us at www.TheWhimsicalWorkshop.com to see all of our patterns and fabrics.

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12 comments:

  1. What a beautiful table runner Heidi! The dies you have used have been on my wish list forever. I now wish I'd have bought them by now. I've really loved the sleigh and snowflake die and the other reindeer since I first saw them. With limited spending money, I've been trying to buy the dies that I can use many, many times to prepare almost any quilt first and then the plan is to start getting the fun ones like those you have used here. Gosh, I think it's about time to start with the fun ones, especially after seeing your beautiful runner.

    Gosh, my favorite decoration for any holiday? Is the Christmas tree considered a decoration? LOL A few years ago I spotted the most gorgeous tree in a store window as we drove past and that very second I said to my husband, I MUST.HAVE.THAT.TREE! Yea, I kinda did say it loudly. It was the most gorgeous purple Christmas tree ever in my favorite shade of purple. I'm sure it was made just for me. haha It's really alot for me to even want a fake tree as I was raised with a real tree and up until just a few years ago when my health went downhill a bit, I have gone to the very same tree farm every single year since I was born wayyyyyyyy back. We'll just say I'm old without using any numbers; we'll just say it was before Nixon was President.. A few weeks later we were out shopping and he pulled into the parking lot near that store saying he'd ordered a book and got an email it was in and ready for him to pick up. Guess what? Yea, he lied so he could go into that same bookstore and buy me that tree. It really was hard for me to go to the fake tree, but getting a beautiful purple one helped a bit.

    Thank you for the wonderful pattern. Gosh, it's still so hard to believe the holidays are SO close.

    vburr at charter dot net

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  2. My heart seems to swell when I think of Christmas. I love the very feel of it all. So many memories and love. Christmas Dinner has always been a favorite time with family all around.
    Thanks,
    Sally
    Miraclebtfly88@aol.com

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  3. I just discovered your Facebook page and your blog. I LOVE it! Christmas is my favorite time of year. I love all of my decorations, but my favorites are my quilted wall hangings and table runners that I get to take out every year. Second is just turning all the lights off in the house and sitting by our Christmas tree. I love your Twas the Night runner! Will you be offering the kit to the non-winners? stephwyatt73@gmail.com

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  4. My favorite decoration is a cross-stitched Christmas Village my dear cousin made for me. I received a new piece every year!

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  5. My favorite decoration is for Halloween - 'THE WITCH IS IN" (currently my profile pic on fb) Love your Runners!!

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  6. wgayla6754@gmail.com, I love this pattern.

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  7. I have Christmas ornaments from when I was a baby until 13 or so. (Decades ago ;) ) some years they make it to the tree, but they are getting more and more fragile. Dnmorris at yahoo.com

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  8. Hi We did draw a winner for the kit and it was wgayla. Make sure to check back next month for our next free pattern and thank you for following along.
    Heidi

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