Matching fabrics and preparing binding

Today during lunch my goal was to find a backing fabric, border fabric and batting for the tree skirt that is underway. I took two of my completed coasters with me to Hobby Lobby to help me in matching the process. For the backing and binding I ended up choosing a red fabric with white polka dots, and for the backing a white fabric with green and red Christmas trees. For the batting I choose a type called natural and warm. For the batting I decided to buy extra for fear that I'd calculated my finished piece size incorrectly. As for the binding and border I knew based on the Missouri Quilt video I needed at least 15 inches for the border and so I believe I decided on 25 inches worth to ensure I had the right amount of it for the border and binding.

When I got home I cut out my border pieces and attached them as instructed in the video. The method they used to have all the borders be straight edges was a blessing! So easy. Next I had to take the backing fabric, batting and tree skirt and pin them together for quilting.

Last week my fantastic quilting teacher had shown me how to use a large piece of cardboard (mine was left over from a large piece of furniture we'd purchased) to secure your backing fabric right side down with pins to ensure it was as tight as possible. After getting the backing secured I needed to lay down the batting. The type I bought was having static cling to everything it touched so the hubby helped me lay it out on the backing fabric. Next we laid out the skirt top an I was able to begin pinning. I pinned the outer border and then squares within. I saw one video in my research that says you should have pins one fist apart from each-other, but there was no way I was going to spend the time putting a pin in all 64 squares. I think I had 24 all together.

After pinning I cut the excess patting and binding down to .5 inches from the edge of the border. This helped a lot when I started quilting. For my Table Runner I had all the excess batting still attached which made it hard to maneuver in the sewing machine. I quilted four areas using stitch 29 again (I think it's my favorite). I used silver rayon thread and did the stitching at speed two. Another great tip my quilting instructor taught me was with the Rayon strings the need room to move and if you put them where your normal spool goes they'll tighten up and potentially your string will break mid sew. So I did what she showed me, I got a coffee cup from the kitchen put the spool in it and in wound a little to release the tension and then set it up in my upper threader. This worked great! I was quilted the border, and 3 inside block sets as you'll see in the photos. I figured this would give good definition on the skirt top and bottom.

After all the quilting was done I cut my binding. I had five strips of about 40 inches each, I sewed the ends together and ironed them in half and finally called it a night.

Border sewed on, ready to meet the backing fabric and batting.

Close up of Skirt Top prior to pinning

Cardboard where I laid out and pinned all three pieces and then cut to size.

Backing Fabric

All three layers pinned together ready to quilt.

Closeup of the Top Stitching in Silver Rayon Thread

Closeup of backing, to show fabric as well as under stitching, if you look closely you'll see the 4 areas that were quilted.

The Countdown is On!

Last year I didn't decorate for the holidays until just a few days prior to Christmas, and then I ended up leaving everything up until the Superbowl because I wanted to enjoy it once it was up. 

This year, I got myself together and put everything up today. We just have a tree, some lights on our banister, and then stocking holders with some knicknacks on the alcove area in our entry way but it looks nice. 

After spending the majority of the morning working on decorating around 2pm I checked the status of my Missouri Quilt order from Monday which has all the goods for my to be Christmas skirt. I was so excited when I saw it was out for delivery, and by 3pm I had everything in my hands! 

Two Dear Claus Charm Packs for the Quilt Top of the Xmas Tree Skirt, 1 Yard Fabric which was intended for the border or backing of skirt, but may be used for something else, a fusion pen that erases with heat!, and a Fruits and Veggie Charm Pack that was 75 cents. 

I rewatched the Missouri Quilt Co. video on the Adorable Xmas Tree Skirt  prior to getting the mail so I could take my notes and be sure that I could start right away when I got my new stuff.

My first item of business was sorting the charm pack there were 4 snow flake patterns, 3 snowman patterns, 5 ornament patterns (3 versions of one type, 2 versions of a second type), 2 stripes block patterns, and 2 merry Christmas music patterns. I had multiples of each of these as each pack came with 42 charms (5by5inch squares). The video shows the tree skirt being made with 81 charms, but the show a second smaller one made with 64 charms that I liked the size of better so I went that route. 

I wanted a pretty random pattern so I laid out 4 rows across (8 charms in each row), then I I built the rest of the rows but building upward (essentially making columns of 8). Once that was complete I had to sew each row together, then I had to sew row one to row two, and so on until all 8 rows were connected. (By the way, in anticipation of starting this project I finally re-organized my stuff so I could utilize the dining room table for showing stuff off and planning!)

Sorry For the Blur, I take these with my phone. Here is the original sew of all the charms in to 8 rows of 8. 

Close Up so you can hopefully see some of the cute fabrics

The next step after getting all the charms together was cutting the corners so it has a more traditional rounded shape. As instructed by the video I went one and a half squares in on each corner and cut straight across leaving a quarter inch of the first square still intact. The reason for these square corners is the great border technique the video teaches, it makes it very easy to complete the corners in borders. 

Quilt Top Cut Down in all Four Corners

Clearer picture of the fabrics. 

Once I finished this portion I took the yard of fabric I had purchased with the charms (which is from the same line provided by Moda) and placed it next to the skirt to see what it would look like. Unfortunetly it is just too busy and bright to serve as the outside border so either tomorrow or Monday I'll be headed out to find a border fabric. I thought I might use it as backing instead, but I only have a yard and once I put a border on the skirt it will need more than a yard I'm pretty sure. 

So until I go get fabric this project is on hold, but I still had 20 some odd charms and a whole yard of pretty fabric so I decided to see what type of patterns I could find that I might want to do. I ended up finding a bunch of fun things that I saved for the future, but didn't find anything that scream use xmas fabric for this. So I watched the Craftsy, Block of the Month May 2012 video which goes over non-traditional log-cabin patterns. One of the patterns was a totally "wonky" log cabin which looked like a lot of fun because it was all about using scraps, and I have a good amount of scraps from the xmas fabrics. 

I decided to give it ago, and you'll have to watch the video to understand how it's made, but my final product turned out pretty well. The only thing that didn't go as planned is I ended up cutting my block down to 11.5 inches round because one side was too short to be 12.5 inches. 

Crazy Wonky Log Cabin Block

All in all quite the productive day. 

Day One, Week Two: Table Runner Project

Wow! I've made it one week, seven whole days since I have begun quilting and I feel like I'm getting the hang of this! 

Today I decided to see if I could find a Christmas Tree Skirt Quilt project, I found a really cute one from the Missouri Quilt Company, which they have YouTube Video for how to make. I watched the video and thought I can make this, so I headed to their site and found they were still having a great Cyber Monday sale, in addition their always $5 flat shipping. For the skirt you need to have 2 Charm Packs (a pack that comes with about 40-42 5" squares of different fabrics bundled for you!) and a border and backing fabric. I purchased all three of those items plus the deal of the day (a charm pack of fruits/veggies prints for 75 cents!), and a marking pin that erases with the heat of the iron all for $35. That order should be here by next week, so I think it will be my week 3 project. 

For my week two project I settled on a Holiday Table Runner pattern I found on McCall's website. Now sure the pattern says it's for Halloween and you need 9 types of fabric, but I knew I could do it with 5 fabrics and in a Christmas/Winter motif. For the table runner instead of each border being different I alternated the outer 4 borders, and had a unique border in the middle surrounding the center square. The challenge with the table runner was it got large fast and was not the easiest to sew. 

Two things that came in handy though: 
1.) The extended table on my sewing machine. I added the extra legs and that helped keep the part of the fabric I wasn't sewing up and out of the way. 
2.) Pinning the strips. Everyone who I watch in YouTube Videos who have been quilting for a while say pinning isn't always necessary and they hate it. Thankfully my quilting instructor had agreed with this sentiment but still made me learn to pin anyways. I used those pinning skills to make sure all my patches lined up properly. 

Here is what the completely sewn together table runner looked like just off the sewing machine:

Top View, notice there are triangles at the end of each row. We take care of those in the next step.

Closeup so you can see the fabrics and hopefully my decent sewing efforts :)

Once all my strips were sewn (ps if I'm using the wrong kind of "sewn" please let me know!) on I  had to cut the table runner down to the right size. Scary! So the cutting instructions said to leave 7.25 inches from the middle of the silver squares, the problem is my table runner is twice the length of my cutting pad so I had to do it in 4 cuts. Thankfully math again came into save the day and I was able to keep everything straight.  Here is where I left off at the end of the night with the table runner. 

Cut to Size! Full Length View. (Would have put it on the table but that's where all my quilting stuff resides.)

Cute Fabrics Right? Who Needs 9 Different patterns!

After I finished sewing the last strips and cutting I had to retire for the evening, but there is definitely more to come on this as I plan to make this my first finished project. Meaning, I better find a video on how to add batting, a border, and "stitch in the ditch!"