Sometimes the most simple quilts can be the most dynamic. I've got a super easy project
that you can customize for your very own state. Let's get started.
I am going to walk you through some very basic steps to create the background and also build
your applique today. But I want you to remember you can make this with whatever state or image
as you really like to make, right? My inspiration from this whole project came when Kaffe Fassett
put out his new collections of these basics. So of course I grabbed this beautiful green,
blue, purple combination, right? But there's several other choices that might be better
for other states based on the colors. So look at that while you're picking what you want
to do. So this is what we made the applique out of. And then Timeless Treasures has these
wonderful ten by ten squares that are really high, bright white on white. You may not even
be able to see the prints. And so I chose that on purpose. I want to build a background
instead of use a solid piece of fabric. One, for the patchwork. But secondly I want to
do that for the construction elements itself. To put a giant applique on a single piece
of fabric could cause a lot of stretching and warping in that single piece of fabric.
So we're actually going to take our ten inch squares. We're going to cut them down
and put them right back together like all good quilters do. And that's going to build
the background and then I'm going to walk you through making your applique for your
own state.
So I've taken my ten inch squares. I have between six and eight of them on the table.
That's based on how well you cut. And I'm going to go ahead and straighten them up as
nice as I can. And I'm going to go ahead and make one ten by five inch rectangle from
all of my pieces. So that is done just like this. Ok? And then the other piece I want
to take and I'm going to make two five by five inch squares. And so I'm taking that
and I'm cutting this down here. So we do that to all 40 pieces of the background fabric,
right? My white on whites. And right now of course all three of these fabrics are the
same so if I just simply pull these two out, set them aside. Pull one more aside. All three
of these are now different. Of course sort all of yours as you go. You can do them in
multiples of three when you cut and then it's an easy swap and stack process. After you
have them sorted out so you have a different fabric in all three positions we're going
to go ahead and piece these together very simply. So I'm going to take the two straight
lines that were cut across here. And I'm actually going to join them at the corner
which has the other two straight cuts. I'm going to use a quarter inch seam allowance
here. And first what I'm doing and for this what I'm doing and I did these squares so
quickly that I didn't even take the time to press in between steps. So I do this way
where I sew together the two five by five squares. And then I simply grab it and I'm
going to take my five by ten rectangle and you see how I have that straight edge, that
straight edge is going to go along the straight edge that I created when I cut the first piece
starting at the top corner to sew this down like this with that same quarter inch seam
allowance. And then I'll go to the iron to press both seams open at once. I'll show
you that trick here in just a second. So we need to move these out of the way for a little
bit. Here's the background that I'm going to show you. And then as I come in here what
I do is iron my two five by fives first. So I'm just going to make sure that that seam
presses in one of the two directions. And then I'm going to go across here and I'm
going to press that rectangle against the squares just like this. And the last step
I would like you to go ahead and do once you've made all of your squares is they should trim
down to 9 ½ by 9 ½. If you want to take them all the way down to nines you can. You
can just start with your square here and take off those two edges. So make sure they're
all the same size so you can start building your background.
And as I was trying to point out, I did the background construction as you hopefully can
see here, I know the white on white may be a little hard to see in the cameras. But again
I didn't want it to stand out but I wanted you to know there was patchwork involved.
And again it's all for the construction. So when I put it back together I also tried
to make sure that my rectangles, I'm hoping you can see that's a rectangle here, matches
up with my two squares. And then maybe a rectangle and a square on the other side. I don't
have a lot of rectangle against rectangle touching. Hopefully no rectangle against rectangle
so that that again manages more of my construction so that it is all built. And once it is all
built I know what size I can make my whole quilt top. You'll have 40 squares, you can
do all kinds of different layouts, squares, rectangles that kind of thing based on your
state. Ah, deep breath. I don't think I came up for oxygen yet.
Now if you look at the state behind me you'll know it is my home state of California. And
it's a big long and tall state. So I put together my squares here. I have six across
and I have seven up the tall I think. Excuse me, I must have five up tall because it finished
55 by 65 when I was all done with the background here. But I did that mathematically so I can
create this large state. So for today because I'm filming in my other hometown of Hamilton,
Missouri. Of course for all of us we're going to go ahead and do the state of Missouri.
And I am going to use the leftover pieces of that wonderful Kaffe Fassett fabric to
show you how. Because I love to use every inch of fabric I possibly can. Now I promised
you information on construction so let's back up a little bit. Here are those Kaffe
fabrics. And what I first did is I unpacked the roll. You can probably see, maybe better
here, that it goes from purple all the way out to green. And if you look at the quilt
down in the bottom is the purple and it goes all the way through up into the green. And
as a matter of fact right here is my center strip so if you look very carefully I put
all of the fabrics in order as they represented to me. Here was my turn around piece. So I
took and I omitted this strip and I saved it for later. It will make great for a quilt
label or something like that. So there's only one of those. And then I continued right
back on the rotation. So those are the same, those are the same, those are the same, and
out you go. You don't have to do it that way but I wanted to manage the colors because
I was thinking of the ocean and the fields and all of the stuff of California. The fabric
represents the state too. So I took all 42 of those Kaffe Fassett prints and I put them
order. And they were 45 inches long when I started. And you can actually see right here
is where the top of California was being cut out from.
And now what we're going to do is we're going to make ourselves an outline that we
can work from for our shape. I'm going to clear off these white squares. So here's
our Missouri. And in our description today I have a really cool website that I've been
using for a long time. It's www.posterazor.sourceforge.net It's the word poster and the word razor
put together. And it's a free software you can use to take any image and print it whatever
size you like on your regular home printer. It doesn't use much ink because you just
have these small pieces or these small lines. But if you look real carefully here's an
8 ½ by 11 and this was an 8 ½ by 11. So this is just my regular home printer paper.
I printed it out to the size I knew I could make because I already made my background.
So I printed this to fit on this. Hopefully that makes sense. I'm trying to teach you
how to be creative a bit in your work but also be organized enough that you don't
work yourself into a corner later. So hopefully you can see that I have actually all of my
state of Missouri positioned within the strips of fabric I've sewn together. And I'm
going to free cut these right now. It's on top of a cutting mat. And I'm going to
pin with some straight pins my paper template out here along this edge. Of course I'm
going to be cutting right along the edge. And I want to try to keep my fabric itself
as flat as possible because we're going to turn this into our applique here in just
a second. I'm going pretty fast just to get these corners pinned. A pincushion of
sorts or a little weighted, or what am I trying to say, beanbag is the word I'm looking
for right now. That would be another handy thing. Ok so it is secure. This is a great
place to use your shark rotary cutter here.
And what I'm going to do is I'm going to cut on the outside of this line. And I'm
just going to come in here and it doesn't have to be perfect. And I'm going to turn
these raw edges under before I make it into an applique. So the more gradual my curve
the easier my life will be down the road. So I'm just going to kind of soften that
edge there. And then these, the straighter the line I make, the easier my life is going
to be. And you can see here I'm cutting through most of the layers. If I have a little
spot I miss I just come back in, put a little more pressure in there. And that frees that
up like this as we go around. Ok, so let's just finish cutting this out real quick. It
doesn't take long. I want you to go slow because with the shark applicutter you're
holding it like a pen and your left hand is part of the work. So you don't want to roll
over those fingers. I'm also cutting to the outside of the line because that's going
to help me with my seam allowance a little bit. I'm not necessarily adding extra shape
to my state. I'm just using what I see there. Ok let's get some of this stuff cleared
off for me because I just, you know, don't want to have all that mess everywhere. And
here we go. Now while I'm finishing this cut. Let's talk about some applique methods
because what I wanted to do for this is I just turned the raw edge under and made my
life easy for when I was appliquing . But as I was doing that I was thinking, I wonder
if some of that fusible little quarter inch tape or a glue stick or a basting glue would
have been a nice choice as well for what I was trying to do. And you'll see that here
if I start sewing around the edge here in just a second. I just want to get the rest
of my boot heel cut out. So I am ready for the masterful Missouri quilt here. Let's
get these pins out of the way. I believe that's all of them, oh there's one more up there.
And I forgot to point out, make sure your state was in the proper orientation for your
fabrics because I was cutting my fabrics right sides up. I did not transpose this because
I'm not doing any fusible web.
Now what we're going to do we're going to flip this over. And I'm just going to
roll this edge under as I come to the sewing machine. I'm just hiding the raw edge so
I can topstitch the state of Missouri to that white background. So here I come in. I'm
going to try to respect about the width of the foot for my seam allowance . And I'm
going to take it nice and slow. One of my tricks is I'm going to use my needle down
function so if I stop the needle stays down. And that way I don't lose track of where
I'm at. And why don't you treat yourself to practicing on one of your nice borders
for your state lines, it's a straight line like I'm doing here. But I'm also sewing
for your benefit and mine towards that boot heel so you can be able to see the curves
are possible. This might have been one of those spots where a little bit of glue may
have been a benefit. Now I'm approaching my curve so I'm kind of pre cheating the
fabrics over in front of me. I'm hoping you can see that. And then with this hand
over here I'm sliding my fabric underneath slightly out of the way. You may get a little
bit of pucker or ripple along that edge. And that's ok because you're going to be topstitching
it down. And it's not going to show. But I really still want to do as good a job as
I can. And that's why I was thinking maybe the glue would have been a nice third hand
or some sort of basting element or something. But it's not necessary. But I'm coming
off of this corner. So I'm going to sew all the way off. I'm going to cut my threads
because of the way that that finishes like this. And now what I can do is I can come
back in with it folded up and over and kind of out of the way. I know this seems weird
but I'm going to fold this corner up here first. I often use my stiletto when doing
this kind of sewing. I know this looks a little unorthodox but nonetheless I'm trying to
teach you that not everything we do with our sewing machine is as we learned in home ec.
Sometimes we have to get a little creative and rowdy. So it may be tough but I'm going
to take this stiletto and I"m going to roll this edge underneath, lower my presser foot
and then I'm getting that stiletto and I'm bringing it forward here. And that's going
to make a beautiful sewn line just like this. And I'm going to come to this corner here
and then I'm going to hit my caffeinated mode. Now that you know that straight lines
and curves are possible, I need to show you how to get this on the background. So let
me finish putting that raw edge to bed and I'll be right back.
Welcome back. As you can see I've gone ahead and stitched all the way around on the raw
edges of my state of Missouri. So the first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to
bring it over to my ironing surface. And I just want to press these edges down a little
bit. And as I'm looking I do want to point out I did forget to tell you your bobbin thread
will intentionally show up on the top side of your project. So on the quilt behind me
I used a green thread in the bobbin for all of the sewing of the state. But on the video
today I used a little bit of white thread so you can see. So make sure your bobbin thread
matches your quilt applique is what I'm trying to say here. And I stalled just long
enough to get that pressed nice. The other thing we want to do is we want to make sure
our background is awesome before we get too far down the road. This is actually the most
challenging section of the entire project today. And it's not difficult. We just want
to take the time to make sure that the applique goes down as nicely and as crease free or
wrinkle free as possible. So right now I'm just giving again a nice run over the top
of this which is the background to the quilt top. These are those squares and rectangles
all came back together.
And now what we're going to do and we want to make sure we have a rigid surface below
us again here. Is we want to begin to layout our state. And I say rigid because I'm going
to put pins through this. Ok so for Missouri my boot heel goes down to the bottom here.
And then the next thing I start to try to do is I'm looking at my straight lines my
state borders. And I want them to be fairly centered within the project. I want them squared
in the project. So I'm doing a little bit of time of visual layout. Here at the top
here at the bottom, corner, side by side, all of that. And now I'm smoothing it by
hand. I don't want to use a basting spray because this can start to make a mess. So
what I am going to do is I'm going to use my nice little curved safety pins. And the
first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to drop one dead center. And I'm actually
kind of pulling the fabric taut at this moment, even more so than when I baste a quilt. Ok
so we're going to lock this down. And now what I'm really doing is just one part at
a time. You see that smoothing, that repetitive patting of the quilt. I'm going to smooth
here and I'm going to drop in the safety pin right near the edge. Now I'm using the
safety pin because I'm going to go back in here and I'm going to machine stitch
around the top of the applique. But before I sandwich this becoming a quilt. So I'm
treating it as if it was a real quilt top though in my technique. So I brought this
down here. Now I'm going to come out to this corner. The more you secure your outer
edges the less your applique will shift. The less it shifts the better it's going to
look. A little bit of shifting or a little bit of waffling will easily be stitched out
in the quilting process. I think that's where they came up with that term. It will
quilt out. Let's get that little hook secured. A couple more of these pins and then the beautiful
thing that you don't know about being an actor/quilter up here is the funny things
happen that you never know. While I'm trying to make sense out of this pinning I keep poking
myself. And you can't see that look on my face. I can't show you how bad it hurts
when I stick myself in the finger with a pin. So if you kids are watching at home, you can
kind of laugh. Everytime you see me go, oh! It's because I'm sticking myself in my
finger here. I'm stalling just long enough to get the last few pins in. Ok any of those
weird corners we're going to really secure. I think that looks terrific.
Ok now what I want to do is remember the thread is really going to really show up. So let's
take a second and switch threads out. And this is a fun trick. If you don't know this
trick. If you have a machine that has more of an industrial style set up you can often
tie threads together like on a serger and just pull them right through. I do this because
on my Baby Lock Jane there are more little eyelets than clips to snap the thread in.
So it makes it much faster to do it this way. We're going to get this threaded up. Now
I'm still using my feed dogs and my regular presser foot. I am not doing this free motion
style however I could. Let's take one of these nice straight runs. Let's make it
easy on ourselves, right? So what we're going to do is we're going to start up here.
We're going to sew to this corner and then we're going to head into the boot heel right
now. So that we're securing as much as possible. Oh I said that but that's backwards. I'm
coming the other way. So I'm starting from the boot heel coming towards the corner. So
I'm going to slide this in. Again really working against any ripples or wrinkles. Now
what I'm going to do. I'm going to drop my sewing foot so that my thread hopefully
covers up some of that white thread. And I'm going to let the feed dogs and the machine
do the work. I'm also kind of putting a little bit of pressure with my hand on the
Kaffe print fabrics to secure them as they go through. And I'm just going to take it
really nice and slow and we're going to applique this state 100% all the way around
to our background. We're going to stop right here because that safety pin is getting pretty
dang close. Let's pull it out. We don't want to ever sew over safety pins or regular
straight pins, just near them not over them. And we're going to come. You can see I've
got a much slower pace with this part of the project. And I'm really securing it with
all of my fingers when sewing around here. And after I do this corner we are basically
going to talk you through the rest of the machine quilting here. Corner, needle is in
the down position so I can pivot everything. And you can already see how nicely this edge
is sewn down. I have no wrinkles no ripples yet. We're just going to start feeding this
through here. And I'm going to ask you to continue on appliquing topstitch style just
like we're doing right here. But I bet you want to hear about the rest of the machine
quilting in the quilt. So follow me close.
We're going to start in the state itself. Now I used a variegated green and purple thread
so it's a little hard to see. But once I had done the applique stitching you saw me
doing then time for the free motion machine quilting process. Again I started right on
the edge and I quilted along the edge. And I did that on purpose because I wanted to
try to do was create the inner valley of California and the mountain ranges. But you can't see
any of it because I used a matching thread so silly me. But what I did is I stitched
around the outside free motion style, holding all of the layers in the quilt together, the
backing, the batting, the quilt top. Then I cut some lines throughout California hoping
to create some mountain ranges and some texture for fun. It didn't show up real well. I
think I over quilted it a bit. But then for fun I bounced out to the background here and
I did a very easy, what I call the circle grid or concentric circle. I didn't want
your eye to notice too much of what was going on in the background. But what was really
fun about that circle grid, and I have a free motion video for you just on that motif, right,
is is a perfect one where your fabric is already gridded out. And because of the way we made
our background in those rectangles and in those squares I didn't have to do any marking.
And I was able to use the patchwork itself so that I could make my arcs from one seam
allowance to the next. And I could also carry over my little bits of my petals so that it
becomes that wonderful all over circle design when you're all done that is a great anchor
for your quilting. But it is not overly distracting so that your eye was able to bring you right
in to your fantastic state that you can hang proudly on your wall in your home so when
all your guests come over you can say, hey isn't this a great quilt? And we learned
it right here at Man Sewing.
Thanks for being a Man Sewing fan. It's great to have you out there encouraging me
to create fantastic new content. If you've missed any of the videos we've got links
for you here and here. And when you're checking those out make sure you're subscribed. We
don't want you to miss any of the action.
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét