My Favorite Block Quilt Along : Heart Block Tutorial

"Heart Block" (shown in two sizes) created by Pam Geisel of For Quilts Sake

Several years ago I wanted to make a heart block but didn't want to use curved pieces so I came up with this pattern. One of the things I like about this block is it utilizes the rotary cutting piecing method of making half square triangles and Flying Geese squares without having to sew along a bias edge, so no bias stretching to worry about.

The block on the left is the 6" (finished) block; the block on the right is the 12" (finished) block.

Cutting for the 6″ block
From the RED fabric (can be the same or different fabric) cut :
 - 1 rectangle : 6½″ x 2″
 - 2 rectangles : 3½″ x 2″
 - 1 square : 3⅞″ x 3⅞″
From the WHITE fabric cut :
 - 4 squares : 2″ x 2″
 - 1 square : 3⅞″ x 3⅞″

Cutting for the 12″ block
From the RED fabric (can be the same or different fabric) cut :
 - 1 rectangle : 12½″ x 3½″
 - 2 rectangles : 6½″ x 3½″
 - 1 square : 6⅞″ x 6⅞″
From the WHITE fabric cut :
- 4 squares : 3½″ x 3½″
- 1 square : 6⅞″ x 6⅞″

Half square triangles (bottom of finished block) : Mark a line on the diagonal on the wrong side of the larger white square, pair with a same size red square placing right sides together.

Sew ¼″ away from both sides the marked line.

Cut on the diagonal line and press the seams toward the red.

Flying Geese (top of finished block) : Mark a line on the diagonal on the wrong side of the four white squares. Lay square on the left side of the smaller red rectangle with right sides together. The line should go from the lower left to the upper right. Unlike the half square triangles, sew ON the line then trim the upper left corner leaving ¼″ seam allowance.

Press seams toward the red. Repeat with the square on the right side of the rectangle with the line going from the upper left to the lower right.

Finishing : Following the diagram, sew the two Flying Geese squares together, and sew those to the top of the long rectangle. Sew the two half square triangles together, and sew those to the bottom of the long rectangle. Press the seam allowances toward the red fabric.

This is a quilted necklace that I made with this block, which is only 1½″ in size.

This tutorial is published for "My Favorite Block Quilt Along" hosted by Kim of Persimon Dreams. You can see photos of finished blocks on the My Favorite Block Quilt Along Flickr site and you can check out the other tutorial for this week the Owl Block at by BeaQuilter.

Tutorial: My favorite strip-facing binding technique

I like to use a strip-facing binding technique because it helps the quilt hang straighter than a traditional binding. I also use this technique when I don’t want the binding to be visible when viewing the front of the quilt.

Once your quilt is quilted, trim it to the final size plus 1/4" all the way around the quilt (just like using a traditional binding). Select your binding fabric. If my quilt has borders, I like to use the same fabric for the binding. If there is more than one color at the edge of my quilt, I try to use a fabric that is similar in color in that area.

For the purposes of this tutorial, I used contrasting colors for the binding strips so it’s easier to see what’s going on.

How to:

Cut two strips 2-1/2” wide by the length of your quilt and two strips 2-1/2” wide by the width of your quilt.

Optional: The 2-1/2” is somewhat random. You could cut them 2” or 3”. Sometimes I’ll cut them wider for larger quilts and narrower for smaller quilts.

Press a 1/4" seam toward the wrong side of the fabric.

Optional: I like to fuse a strip of 1/4" fusible tape on this seam

 

The strips pinned to the front of the quilt

Lay the strips on the front of your quilt, right sides together with the 1/4" seam closer to the middle and pin along the edges.

Optional: The strips on the top (in this case the blue ones) can be a little smaller than the width of the quilt to keep the bulk out of the corners. Also, if you used some fusible adhesive, pull the paper off the part that goes under the other binding strip.

The strips sewn to the front of the quilt and the fusible paper removed

Sew around the quilt 1/4" from the edge. I like to backstitch in the corners to make them stronger. If you used fusible adhesive, remove the rest of the paper backing.

View from the side...the seam is on the edge

Pull the binding strip around to the back so the seam is now on the edge of the quilt. Use your fingers to push the corners out (similar to when you use a pillowcase backing but much easier since you don’t have to reach to get to the corner).

View of the finished back

Press with an iron so it will lay flat. If you used fusible adhesive, fuse it down.

Hand sew the edges down. I’ll do this even if I’ve used fusible but I’ll make the stitches farther apart than if I hadn’t used fusible.

Other tips:

If you plan it right, you can machine sew them down as part of the quilting. For smaller quilts like the Feather series, I quilted the middle and part of the edges before the binding but went back and did more quilting after the binding was added so some of the quilting would hold the edges down.

Tips for Using Blogger

Me with "All the Colors" at the Springfield Museum of Art's Annual Members' Juried Exhibition last month.

I can't believe it's been a whole year since I started this blog. This is my 65th post, which means I'm posting more than one per week, and I have 39 wonderful followers, over half of whom I've never met. There have been an average of 10 people per day looking at the blog.

In that time I've picked up a few tricks, here are two of them:  

Loading multiple photos in the order you want them.

Decide what photos you want to use before you start a new post and load up the photos in reverse order, so the photo you want to be last in your post is the first photo you attach.

For multiple photos, after the first one is selected (but before you click on "Upload Image") select "Add Another Image" then find the photo you want to be second to the last, and so on. The photo you want to appear first on the blog will be the last one you load. (Thanks to Lisa Q. who gave me this tip.)

Copying and pasting text.

When I first started this blog, I know I was able to copy and paste in the Compose view, but somewhere along the way, I lost that option. Maybe it's a different version of Windows, or maybe I'm using a different browser, but I can no longer paste into the Compose view.

So now if I want to paste text, I'll write "HERE" in the Compose view, then change to the Edit Html view, find where I typed the word "HERE" and paste the text over it, go back to the Compose view and there's the text that I pasted.

Do you have any tips that you want to share? If so, post them in the comments section.

How to Make a Watercolor Quilt

What is a Watercolor Quilt? Traditional quilts use different colors and shapes to make patterns. Watercolor quilts use the intensity of the colors and the values (light to dark) to create their patterns. The fabric is usually small squares or strips with brightly colored floral patterns. This post offers a brief description of how to design a watercolor quilt, it assumes that you already know how to make a quilt.

Step 1 - Designing

Start by drafting a design on paper. Since it's values that are important and not colors, you can use a pencil on graph paper. Make some areas dark, light, and medium in value. Figure out how many squares you'll need of each. Traditionally watercolor quilts are made of 2" x 2" squares. When sewn together with a 1/4" seam allowance, the final size of each square will be 1.5" x 1.5".  

Step 2 - Sorting
Organize your 2" x 2" squares into three piles: dark, medium and light. Darks usually have a background that is black or a very dark color with foreground colors that are very vivid and bold. Lights usually have a white or very light colored background with foreground colors that are pastel or muted. Sometimes it helps to have a "medium-dark" and "medium-light" pile.

Step 3 - Arranging

Arrange your dark, medium and light squares based on your design. Step back and look at it, then rearrange squares until they fit your design better. You can rotate the squares or even use the back sides if you like that better. This is sometimes the hardest part because I'll want to keep arranging and I have to make myself stop. 




Step 4 - Finishing
Piece together, quilt and bind.

Resources If you don't have lots of brightly colored floral fabrics, you can buy a set of 200 pre-cut 2" x 2" squares. You can also buy them in strips and fat quarters. A handy tool for making watercolor quilts using 2" squares is "Quilt Fuse," a fusbible webbing that has a 2" x 2" grid marked on it. Arrange your fabric on the Quilt Fuse using the grid, fuse them in place with an iron, then fold the rows over and sew a whole row at one time.

Here are some watercolor quilts that I designed and made: Watercolor Sunset, and Watercolor Swirl.

If you've made a watercolor quilt, please post a link to a photo of it in the comments section.