Just Sew Quilter: May 2021

Monday, May 17, 2021

My Day for Born to Be Wild and Crafter's Edge

I have 2 projects to share for my turn in this blog hop. Both projects used dies from Crafter's Edge and the Crossover II die cutting machine from Crafter's Edge.

This is the Crossover II at work cutting 2" tumblers.

These are all the dies I used in my first project. I used the smallest and largest tumblers, all the hearts, and all the balloons but the largest. I found that cutting 4 layers of tumblers at a time worked best for me. When I ironed Heat N Bond Lite on the fabrics for appliques, I cut 2 layers at a time and that worked well.

So, first I cut out stacks of 6" tumblers using fabrics I had in my stash that made me think "Wild."

Then I arranged them on my design wall in an order that was pleasing to me.

Once they were up there, I thought adding some black sashing (1 1/4" strips) would look nice.

I sewed pairs of tumblers together and then stitched on the sashing.

After I had the center of the top together, I made strips of 2" tumblers to put into the borders.

Here's a border in process--1 1/4" strip, 2" tumbler strip, 2" strip on the outside.

After I had the entire top together, I quilted it on my Juki Miyabi.

(Please excuse the pathetic orchid to the left--I am hoping it will rejuvenate but have my doubts.)

Here is the finished top, but I am not done with it yet!

I added lots of applique! I couldn't decide whether I wanted all those bright colors on this quilt, but after laying some on the top, I decided I rather liked it after all. The elephant is a coloring page that I enlarged. When I stitched the larger balloon strings so that the elephant was holding some of the balloons, it was impossible to see them, so I couched some black rattail (I think that's what it's called) using my couching foot on my Juki. Those strings still don't show very well, but they are a lot better than they were! She's done--I haven't figured out a name for it yet, kind of thinking of "A Parade of One."

Here it is outside on our clothesline. I added a dot in the iris of the eye to give the elephant a little spark.

You can see that white dot better in this picture, I think, and the balloon strings are more visible too.

My next project is not necessarily wild, but it is plant-related, so sort of wild???

I made a bunch of flower pincushions using Crafter's Edge flower dies. I love working with wool, and these are all cut out of wool and wool felt. I made the ladybug, butterfly, and flower pins, by breaking the shanks off buttons and hot gluing the buttons onto needles. The pincushions are stuffed with poly fiberfil. These made a wonderful project to work on while watching tv. I love my bouquet of flowers!