Category Archives: Applique

Farm Quilted Banner

Posted on June 13, 2018 by heARTs Creations

PP Tomatoes heARTsCreations.com (Medium)

My cousin Sal has a small farm at the lovely Bed and Breakfast he and his partner Beverly have in the Hudson Valley of New York. He began the farm portion a couple of years ago and sells garlic and veggies at his farm stand. He asked if I would make a banner type quilt for the stand and I gladly said “yes.” Originally, I sketched a fairly easy design that would have been quick to make. I planned to use vegetable fabrics and batiks. Those fabrics did get used, however, the design changed drastically when I found patterns for paper pieced veggies that I blogged about here.

The quilt began to come to life on the design board and I needed to put the name of the quilt in a prominent position. Oh why, oh why, did he have to name the farm “Patchwork Quilt Farm?!” That’s a long name! The actual reason is that the previous owner of the property sold quilts from the barn. I did not want to paper piece all those letters nor did I want to applique and stitch around all those letters. The perfect answer was iron on vinyl! It shows up so well and this is, after all, a banner that will hang outside, not a cuddle quilt!

Leftover fabrics were used in the backing. I proudly sent it off to him and his reaction upon receipt was everything I wished for. I look forward to seeing a picture of the quilt hanging at his stand (and yes, I put a sleeve on the back to help that along.)

Linky Tuesday, (too) Cute Tuesday, WIPs on Wednesdays

Needle and Thread Thursday

Playful Pillow

Posted on May 16, 2018 by heARTs Creations

An Island Batik Adventure

Such a fun adventure – “Playful Pillow.” It wasn’t much of a decision for me as I knew I wanted another pillow for my sofa to go with the one I made last year with our curves adventure. I got the idea from potholders made by Patchwork Pottery.

The pillow top was easy and it was the first project I attacked at my Spring retreat. As soon as I got home I embroidered the face, backed the pillow front and quilted it. I kept it simple because I wanted the kitty’s face to be the focus of the pillow.

It finishes at a generous 20 inches and I love the way it looks side by side with my other Island Batik pillow.

The fabrics were provided by Island Batik and the threads by Aurofil.

Linking up with: Let’s Bee Social, My Quilt Infatuation, Midweek Makers

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Posted in Applique, Art, Color, Embroider, Fabric, Island Batiks, Quilting and tagged Color, Embroidery, Patterns, projects, Quilting. Bookmark the permalink.

Applique – So Much Color

Posted on May 2, 2018 by heARTs Creations

Several years ago I saw the applique pattern, “Lollipop Trees” by Kim McLean and immediately fell in love. An impossible task? I was up for the challenge! The pattern was gifted to me on my birthday and I began block one and finished it! But…I didn’t care for the background fabric I used so that block got tossed into the maybe I’ll see you one day bin and I began again. This time I chose a gray on white fabrjc and for all the applique pieces I am using Kaffe Fassett fabrics. Two blocks are complete and I am part way through block number 3.

I am in love! And I am enjoying the applique process. I work on it for a little while in the evenings and have found it very relaxing. I’m not sure how many of the blocks I will do. I plan on using this as a wall hanging, so maybe six or eight. Four complete this year? That’s my goal! We’ll see!

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Posted in Applique, Art, block pattern, Color, Fabric, Kaffe Fasset, Pattern, Quilting and tagged Color, Patterns, projects, Sewing. Bookmark the permalink.

Koi Pond Quilt

Posted on March 26, 2018 by heARTs Creations

On July of 2016 I posted about a quilt top I designed using Kaffe Fassett fabrics and was finishing it up. I did and had it quilted and then it just sat in my quilting closet. When the quilt top was finished, I thought it looked like a pond of water. I even had the quilting design to look like ripples of water. Finally, a year and a half later, the Koi Pond Quilt was born!

2nd border (Large)

The pattern for the koi fish is from the book (I cannot find the book anywhere and really want to give the author/designer credit. As soon as it’s found, I’ll update this post!) From my small stash of silks and other fine fabric, I began to piece the fish together as an applique.

I am very pleased with the outcome, and even more pleased that after all this time, the quilt is complete! It’s a lot easier than tending an outdoor Koi pond! Hmmm…why did I wait so long?!

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Posted in Applique, Art, block pattern, Color, Fabric, Kaffe Fasset, Pattern, Projects, Quilting and tagged Color, Patterns, projects. Bookmark the permalink.

What I’ve Been Working On

Posted on March 23, 2018 by heARTs Creations

I’m a planner. It seems to be my nature. Some of it probably comes from years of administrative work and deadlines. I’m the one when going on a retreat or trip is packed days ahead of time. (Spring retreat is in four weeks and my projects are packed!) I do think it’s a good thing although it tends to make a few folks think perhaps I’m a bit off balance!

As an Island Batik Ambassador, we’re sent the year’s calendar events with project themes. I’ve combined getting ready for retreats with my Island Batik Adventures – I’ve sketched, written plans and cut fabrics. My April project, “Vintage made New” is done and here are the fabulous fabrics I used. I can’t wait for my reveal very soon! I am ridiculously giddy about this one.

“Playful Pillows” is the May event, and I’ve got a real cutie planned for a much needed new pillow for our sofa in our TV watching area. Here are the fabrics all ready:

June’s event is “Modern Batik Challenge.” I have a really fun baby quilt planned, combining a scrappy modern look with applique. It will make a terrific baby gift using these fabrics:

I found July to be somewhat challenging. Not so much in finding a pattern, but finding one I wanted to use. The challenge is “Pattern Play, Secondary Pattern.” These too are all cut and ready to sew at retreat:

August is our Great Outdoors Blog Hop. This is when all the ambassadors reveal a newly released fabric line using a Spring/Summer 2018 bundle. I was so excited about the beautiful fabric line I received I went right to work. I had an idea all sketched out, but one evening I went through my pattern bin and found a pattern I’ve had for years and have always wanted to do. Yup – next day I had it all cut out and it is now nearly done! Just a bit more quilting and binding!

There may not be a lot to show here, but you can see I have been busy planning and prepping. I have a few ideas for the rest of the year, but will hold off as we’ll receive a new shipment of fabric in July and the fabric will be part of the inspiration. Now I can go ahead and pull out a work in progress bin and make some progress there. Should have something to share soon!

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Posted in Applique, Art, Fabric, Island Batiks, Modern Quilting, Organization, Pattern, Projects, Quilting and tagged Color, Patterns, projects, Quilting, Sewing. Bookmark the permalink.

New to Me & Different Technique!

Posted on March 1, 2018 by heARTs Creations

An Island Batik Adventure

Try a Technique For the month of March we ambassadors were asked to try a new technique – something we had never done before. The list we made amongst ourselves was endless: binding techniques, different types of applique, specialty rulers, clothing construction, art quilts, and the list went on and on. There were so many more things to consider, many of which I have done at least once. Maybe not perfected, maybe not well, but I had done it. Hmmmm. Then I saw a pic of a fabric vase type of structure. Okay! Here I go!

After sketching and cutting out a shape from paper, I played with it in a standing up position. I then cut that shape out of a heavy stabilizer. Having chosen several bright batiks, I began to cut them into random rectangular shapes, join them and place the piece onto the stabilizer securing it with basting spray. I also added another bright batik as the backing. I chose several of my Aurifil threads and quilted all the sections and then trimmed around the outer edge. I finished the edge with satin stitching and yes, this part was tedious.

Vase base heartscreations.com

Now the vase needed some life, some dimension. I covered a thin piece of rope with fabric and zig zagged it onto the base. I cut out a front and back for two random shaped flowers from a bright pink batik and sandwiched them with a leftover piece of some Thermore batting pieces I had, giving them dimension. This is a wonderful light weight batting to work with. I machine quilted each flower and added some beads in the center of each and then went on to make three leaves using the same method. After arranging the flower and leaves onto the base, I stitched each piece onto the base.

I then put the piece on end, made it into a cylinder and hot glued it together. And there it is! A glass vase hides inside nicely tucked away. It’s perfect having a yard full of daffodils this week – in the vase they went. So much color and the promise of Spring!

Vase w flowers heARTsCreations.com

Linking up with: NTT, One Monthly Goal

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Posted in Applique, Art, Color, Fabric, Island Batiks, Projects, Quilting, Thread and tagged Beads, Color, flowers, projects, Quilting, spring, Thread. Bookmark the permalink.

Mini-Love Table Topper

Posted on February 21, 2018 by heARTs Creations

An Island Batik Adventure

Mini quilts are fun to create and are usually a quick finish. A table topper seemed in order for me and I decided to stay with the same theme as my Galentine’s card. In the last two years I have gone from having no table runners or toppers to several including many which are seasonal. Now I have one for Valentine’s!

My table toppers are all square so I changed it up a bit and went round. I pulled pinks and purples out again to make it an obvious Valentine. All the fabrics used in this project were supplied to me by Island Batik.

Hubby has this really cool compass that I used to draw a large circle onto lightweight paper. Using the crazy quilt block method, I began with a five sided shape, then began piecing around it somewhat randomly. Hearts were then appliqued all around.

Once it was as big as the circle pattern, I sandwiched the top with batting and a backing. All the seams were stitched with a decorative stitch. I trimmed it to the circle shape and did an overall loop-de-loop quilting. For the piecing and quilting I used Aurifil threads.

Time for binding! Because it was a circle, I knew I’d need to cut the binding on the bias but didn’t really want to cut into that much fabric. I’d never used rick-rack as a binding before and thought it would look cute. Hubby even went out to buy the rick-rack for me – now that’s a good Valentine!

Mini love full (Large)

All done and I really like the way it looks on the dining table. One more holiday table topper in my collection!

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Posted in Applique, Art, Color, Fabric, Island Batiks, Projects, Quilting, Thread and tagged Color, projects, Quilting, Thread. Bookmark the permalink.

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