A Charming Barn Quilt - Fruit Cocktail style

It might have taken me ALL summer to get this A Charming Barn Quilt finished, but I'm so glad I pushed and finished it. It is so dang cheerful, you just have to smile when you see it.

Fruit Cocktail by Fig Tree Quilts & Co. for Moda Fabric is so fun to make up. The colors, the prints - so cheerful, so joyful, and in-your-face full of sunshine and summer goodness.

And there's always a bit of special summertime when you are able to spend some time at Lake Ada with your favorite people.

This A Charming Barn Quilt {Fruit Cocktail} will be one of those special quilts as I was able to get a good start on it while at Lake Ada. (Yes, my machine and a few basic supplies came along for the trip : )

While a tiny part of me might have border regret (this print is one of my favorites of Fruit Cocktail - but maybe a tad bit too busy as a border), I do think this binding/border combination is perfect! Don't think you can ever go wrong using a stripe as binding.

The center of this A Charming Barn Quilt is fairly stunning, if you ask me. At first I was going to do red as the star, but color placement wasn't working quite right. In the end the oranges and yellows in the center are just wow!

Quilting is 1" spaced lines in a simple hashtag design.

  

For a moment I considered diagonal quilting (it always seems to be perfect for wallhangings) but the straight-line hashtag quilting kept tickling at my brain so I went with it. 

It's kinda perfect on this quilted wall hanging.

This quilted wallhanging might be coming down sooner than later to make way for fall, but for the moment it is the shining star on the wall, and I really appreciate its cheerfulness.

Happy quilting, everyone : )

Anna 

Mini Charm Fun Daisy - A Country Rose Scrappy Table Runner

If you are making or have made my Jelly Twist quilt pattern, there is enough of a little snippet left on each jelly roll strip to make 2 1/2" mini charm squares. 

Sewing with Country Rose Lella Boutique for Moda Fabrics has been such a joy, I just could NOT put these little scraplets away. They just HAD to be made up into a little quilt immediately.

Using my Mini Charm Fun - Daisy quilt pattern and these darling little Country Rose scraps, I made up this quick table runner and I couldn't be more thrilled with how it turned out.

The black diagonal check print makes the perfect binding. Love how it pops. 

Diagonal straight-line quilting for the win. It always seems to be the perfect choice when sewing with mini charm squares (2 1/2" squares).

Those quilted squares in the border are just about perfect. And that little white and blue floral print, a favorite of mine from the Country Rose fabric line.

How about this cute little quilt roll?! I think everything needs to be bound with diagonal check : )

If you have some little square quilt scraps and a bit of border, you might want to give 

Mini Charm Fun - Daisy a try. She's a quick quilted table runner to finish.

Happy quilting, everyone : )

Anna

New Quilt Pattern: Jelly Twist - Country Rose

 

Jelly Twist quilt pattern is such a fun quilt to sew and it all started with this jelly roll... 

Country Rose by Lella Boutique for Moda Fabrics made making this quilt extra fun. There isn't anything I don't like about this fabric line.

Dear eldest daughter did such a great job piecing the blocks. Her piecing is much more accurate than mine and made putting the rows together (my part of this quilt making) a breeze.

Snapped this picture before basting and quilting. Don't you just love the mix of florals and checks?! The checks of Country Rose are just perfect!

My favorite print (well, one of them : ) - it's the prefect blue with the perfect little white print.

The blocks of Jelly Twist are pieced in a log cabin block fashion so very straightforward, simple, and quick. When I make blocks like this using a jelly roll, I cut one strip at a time but stack each piece in its own pile. At the end of cutting there's a pile for each step from each strip. Then, I chain or batch piece one step at a time, snip part, press, move on to the next step. Before you know it, all the blocks are pieced. (I should really take some pics of this process...)

Twisting and turning the quilt blocks gives a sashing effect without the sashing. Anybody else not crazy about sashing or is it just me? 

Another word or few about the lovely fabric line Country Rose, the black is perfect. It's such a bold color and can seem too bold sometimes but it plays perfect with all the other colors of Country Rose.

Did I mention the lovely butterscotch color? So lovely!

Using Moda Bella Black for binding was a no-brainer for binding. Looks great with the quilt top and with the quilt back, which is a CuddlDuds flannel sheet. These flannel sheets make great quilt backs - so soft and so far no pilling.

The Jelly Twist quilt pattern includes instructions for five sizes using precut jelly roll/rolie polie strips 

or you can cut your own from fabric stash or scraps.

If you make up this pattern, please share (if you are so inclined) 

using #jellytwistquilt or #fddquiltpatterns. 

We would all love to see your quilty creation.

Happy quilting, everyone : )

Anna

New Quilt Pattern: Thoughtful

 

It's time to introduce Thoughtful, a layer cake, fat quarter, fat eighth, yardage quilt pattern,

making it a very versatile quilt pattern.

My sample quilt is made with six different prints of Winter Solstice from Michael Miller Fabrics. These prints are wintery without being too wintery. I'm thinking they can come out in October/November and go through February into March, depending on where you live. The black accent fabric of choice is Moda Marble black.

This here is my favorite print of the Winter Solstice line. 

That barn has my heart.

The blocks are large at 18" so once you have them pieced, putting together the rows and the quilt top goes very fast. Love that!

Thoughtful quilt pattern does have a lot of folded/snowball corners. I thought these would be so very tedious and take forever, but I did them in batches by color and they finished up more quickly than I anticipated.

When doing folded/snowball corners, I like to move my needle over a couple clicks and stitch just outside the mark line from corner to corner. This gives me a tiny bit that I can trim off and get a more accurate block that pieces so much nicer (at least for me : )

The large blocks are a dream to piece together even with matching up the "diamonds".

Seeing those diamonds come together is my favorite part.

It's always a "wow" when I flip it over.

I never want to forget how the Thoughtful quilt pattern came about. 

When I first saw Winter Solstice I immediately wanted to make with it for my husband and myself. I thought he would really like it. So I ordered it and received it, and he really did like it. 

My quilt plan was to keep it really simple and make up my Simply Done quilt pattern. I printed out the layout, and my husband said, "It's nice but what if you turned some of the pieces?" 

Easy enough, thinking giant pinwheels. Printed that layout. "Oh, this is really nice but kinda boring." Okay. Back to EQ. Added the white center diamonds. "Now this is looking interesting, but maybe a little too white." Added the black diamonds. "Oh, honey. This is perfect. I really like this!" And a new quilt pattern was born. I called it Thoughtful to remind myself of the goodness and joy that comes from being thoughtful and considering someone else's wishes and vision.

I made the twin size quilt and love how it fits lengthwise across our king bed. It covers just enough for a custom quilty look and coordinates beautifully with the red quilted bedspread underneath.

Thoughtful is written to use yardage, layer cake 10" squares, fat quarters, or fat eighths.

Here it is colored with a Country Rose layer cake by Lella Boutique for Moda Fabrics.

Here is another beautiful coloring in a Dwell layer cake by Camille Roskelley for Moda Fabrics.

Doesn't Thoughtful quilt pattern look stunning in the patriotic colors of American Dream?

The Thoughtful quilt pattern is available in my shop.

Happy quilting, everyone : )

Anna

Just a Charm Pack Quilt - I Believe in Angels

When I began percolating ideas for Moda Fabrics #charmpackchallenge2023 a charm pack of I Believe In Angels was what I really wanted to make with but thought its small prints might make it too busy for making #justacharmpack little quilt. But, I wanted to make with it so badly that I forged ahead.

 

This #justacharmpack quilt doesn't have a pattern. It is literally just charm pack squares, no background, sewn in pairs to make half-square triangles (HSTs). The general idea is to pair lights and darks. If you don't have an equal number of lights and darks, just select another color to substitute as a light, in this case the light blue prints.

HSTs are so much fun to make with. They present almost endless layout possibilities.

A few other #justacharmpack quilts I've made can be seen here and here and here and here. You can play with layouts all day : )

Simple stripe fabric from I Believe in Angels as the binding. It came out so tidy and neat (not that I'd redo it if it didn't : )

I find this fabric line from Moda Fabrics to be very versatile. It's a Christmas line but also feels perfect for going into Valentine's Day and late winter/very very early spring. The little prints are just darling.

This Just a Charm Pack quilt finishes at 24" square.

Again I used flannel as the batting and just backed with a Moda Bella Solid (solids are less costly than prints ; )

This little quilt turned out so darling. I love it! (I don't think it's too busy at all.) It's hanging on the wall above my computer and is just perfect with the freshly fallen snow.

Quilt pattern now available in my shop here!!!

Happy quilting, everyone : )

Anna