Hello, my fellow ghost-sewing friends! This is the final week of my Five Little Ghosts QAL. (Read all the QAL details here.) This week, we’re assembling our quilt tops, and starting next week, those who’ve complete at least one ghost block can enter to win one of the QAL prizes!
If you’re sewing the runner, you will be adding 3.75" x 9" background blocks to your ghosts and then sewing five ghosts together with sashing rectangles in between the blocks and at each end of the row. A final border on the top and bottom completes assembly.
If you’re sewing the throw-size quilt (download the free PDF expansion pack for Five Little Ghosts and Friends here), each block is sashed individually, creating the patchwork effect in the background. Then you will add your side borders, followed by the top and bottom borders.
Choosing a Pressing Plan
There’s no subject more divisive among quilters than pressing. As I explain on page 13 of Not-Your Typical Jelly Roll Quilts, my default is to press seams open because I think doing so creates a flatter, easier-to-quilt seam. The exception is when pressing to the side facilitates nesting and prevents me from having to pin joins to get them to line up properly.
Throughout both Five Little Ghosts and Five Little Ghosts and Friends, I press my seams open. If you’re a side presser, you could press the seams for the top and bottom borders of each ghost block in alternating directions. This approach would help you nest the seams of blocks in the same row. If that makes you happy, go for it!
Then you could press the seams in the finished rows in alternating directions to nest those seams.
My caveat is that the blocks are 11" x 16.5". Because of their size, I am going to pin my blocks together before sewing. I could nest my seams, but because nesting won’t get me out of pinning, I’ll press open.
Thinking About the Quilting
I passed my throw-size project on to a longarmer who quilted it with a fabulous spider-web panto. I love it!
The runner was an opportunity for me to have some fun, though. In general, I am a straight-line quilter. (I do free-motion quilt, but I don’t FMQ enough to be particularly good at it.) I made a template to quilt wavy lines on my runner using my walking foot. I was super pleased with the results!
Embroidering the Details
You can read on page 25 of Not-Your-Typical Jelly Roll Quilts how I embroidered the ghosts’ eyes. I added those small details after my runner was quilted and bound because I wanted the cross-stitches to stand out a bit from the quilting. You could just as easily embellish with some embroidery to your quilt top before you quilt it.
For my Five Little Ghosts and Friends project, I think I am going to embroider the eyes of one ghost in each row. All I need to do is to finish the binding and embroider those details. See tuned for a full reveal next week!
Quilt-Along Schedule and Resources
Fabric Pull (Week 0): Blog post and YouTube video
Cutting (Week 1): Blog post and YouTube video
Sewing Ghost Blocks (Weeks 2 and 3): Blog post and YouTube video
Assembling the Top (Week 4): [you’re here] and YouTube video [forthcoming!]
Halloween Parade of Blocks and Tops: Oct. 17 - Oct. 31, 2025
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