I'm In! Falling Stars Sew-Along / Beauties Pageant 330

April proved to be a time of RPI: rapid project initiation. This phenomenon had nothing to do with me and my weakness for the thrill of a new fabric pull. It had everything to do with the limited brick-and-mortars in my area.

This bout of RPI all started with my next crafty production-line obsession: drawstring bags. Two friends swear by their heat presses for speeding up the interfacing process, and I was intrigued. After investigating buying a commercial heat press secondhand, I placed an order for a more-compact new unit.

What did I do while I waited for the heat press? I started Stara—that colorful project from a few weeks ago. Once I discovered its issues with shadowing, however, I had to place an order for new background fabric.

What did I do while I waited for the heat press and new fabric? I started Falling Stars, the current sew-along from the Modern Quilt Guild (MQG). 

Falling Stars is a fun sew: It’s all about 2.5-inch squares and half-square triangles (HSTs), and requires an eye for value. I used the opportunity to bust through my low-volume scraps, pairing those mostly white and off-white fabrics with blacks and grays from my stash.

At first blush, the block seems humble enough. Once you pair two together, however, you can see the magic at work ...

If you’re an MQG member and considering joining, it’s not too late (learn more here). And I have some advice for you: I’ve been streamlining the cutting and piecing processes with great success. First, instead of making two-at-a-time HSTs per the pattern instructions, I used the HST die on my Accuquilt Go. This means I’ll be sewing bias edges, but still, I won’t have to trim anything—and I’d take bias edges over trimming any day. If you don’t have an Accuquilt Go, may I suggest making a friend who does?

I am also using the web-piecing method. Although I first heard of this technique a decade ago, I only recently tried it out. This is not the technique where you use a thin layer of interfacing to lay out and sew a block together. It’s the one where you chain-piece the first-column pieces to the second-column pieces, cut the thread, chain-piece the third-column pieces to those units, cut the thread, and continue until all the pieces are attached. (Then, that’s the point where you press and sew the rows together.) As a gal who has a habit of zoning out for just long enough to mix up the order of a patchwork block, I’m sold on the web-piecing approach. 

I know the linky focuses on finishes, but I want to hear about your new projects, too. What have you started up recently?

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A Quilt Trade / Beauties Pageant 329

There’s something special about owning projects made by other makers. You can find such projects throughout my house—I have mini-quilts, pouches, and other items I’ve either been gifted or have purchased from other sewists and quilters. 

A few months ago, I laid claim to a friend’s finished Folk Blooms quilt (pattern by Lindsay O’Neil of Pen and Paper Patterns). "Laid claim" is the appropriate phrase. My friend didn’t offer to gift it to me. I didn’t offer to purchase it. But I was immediately smitten with the throw-size project and asked whether she had a recipient in line. When she said didn’t, we agreed to a trade.

Now the only question was, what would I make for this friend in return? At some point in the months that followed, she saw my in-process scrappy Quilty Stars (pattern by Emily Dennis of Quilty Love) and decided it would be perfect for her.

Pictured here is Quilty Stars, all quilted and bound and in the hands of its new owner. This project had been a WIP for a few years, just waiting for some free time in my sewing schedule to become a priority.  

Quilty Stars was my opportunity to use up dark-blue and low-volume prints from my scraps and stash. Some prints appear once, maybe twice, in the quit top. Many others appear in many more blocks. That’s how I like my scrappy projects: Repetition creates much-needed cohesion for me.

To counter all the scrappiness on the quilt top, the backing is a solid pale green. A friend quilted a figure-eight edge-to-edge panto over the collection of blue and white fabrics, and I used my last remnants of Denyse Schmidt’s Hope Valley for the binding.  

For the first time, my guild has organized a more formal quilt swap this year, called Secret Buddies, and I’m excited to take part in that. It’s not a person-to-person trade, though: The person you’re making a quilt for isn’t the person sewing for you. In addition to making a throw-size quilt, participants surprise their partners with a few gifts throughout the year. The quilt and buddy reveal isn’t until November, though, so don’t expect to see anything around here for a while! : )

Have you ever swapped finished quilts with another quilt maker?

Event Tomorrow!

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The pageant rules are simple:

• Post your finish in the linky tool. (No links to your own giveaway or linky, please!)
• Point your readers back here with a text link or use the button above.
• Visit and comment on other participants’ finishes.

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Pivot! Pivot! / Beauties Pageant 328

I can’t use the word "pivot" without thinking of the episode of Friends when Ross convinces Rachel and Chandler to carry a couch up flights of stairs to his apartment. (Spoiler alert: Things do not end well for the couch.) The story I’m about to tell you about pivoting, however, features neither furniture nor nineties TV-show plot lines ...

 

I started a new project! After finishing four baby quilts for charity, I thought I deserved to embark on something new, despite the small pile of WIPs staring me down each day. I chose Stara, a pattern by Taralee Quiltery because I had already purchased the corresponding acrylic templates from Cut Once Quilts back in 2025. 

 

I planned to use some black Starry scraps for the spiky triangles (see them in the full design here), leftover Ruby Star basics for the nine-patches, and white-on-white Punch Hole Dots from my stash. Are you picking up on the theme here? All the fabric was from my stash or scrap bin, and everything was Ruby Star. What could go wrong?

 

I started with piecing the white background with spiky Starry triangles and, after an hour or two of sewing, realized Something Very Bad was happening. Because of my light background and the sharp angles of the triangles, the black Starry would show through my pressed seams. 

 

In the past, I haven’t realized comparable shadowing issues until the project at hand was quilted. In other words, it was too late to address the issue. I knew I wouldn’t be pleased with my finished Stara, so I pivoted. My order for different background fabrics should arrive on Monday.

 

Often a snafu like this one would call for a time-out—I would need a break from the problematic project. The issue with placing a quilt top in process into time-out, though, is that it will most likely become just another WIP. To maintain the momentum I had built up for Stara, I persevered with the nine-patches. Playing with colorful fabrics did my heart good, and I made good progress while waiting for the new background options to arrive. Phew—background-fabric crisis and potential WIP averted!

 

Are you able to pivot mid-project like that, or are you more of a time-out kind of quilter?

 

Also, something else I’m curious about ... The Starry scraps were from wideback yardage. I know that fabric manufacturers use different gray goods to produce widebacks and that widebacks tend to shrink more than standard-width quilting cottons, so I treated these scraps with Retayne, a color fixative, and dried them on high. Have you ever used wideback for piecing? Please share your insight in the comments!

 

As for the other quilt of mine with shadowing issues, it was my own design: Set to Spin. I was able to come up with a workaround for that particular pattern, but I noticed the problem too late in the process to save my sample. Of course, you don’t notice the shadowing unless you’re curled up with the quilt ...

 

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The pageant rules are simple:

• Post your finish in the linky tool. (No links to your own giveaway or linky, please!)
• Point your readers back here with a text link or use the button above.
• Visit and comment on other participants’ finishes.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter