*Lots* of eye candy for you today! Last week I received a little bit of designer Laura Gunn‘s new line, Edges, in the mail. It arrived courtesy of Michael Miller Fabrics. I absolutely love the colors she chose for her latest collection.

As I was laying out the charms to take pictures, I was getting more and more excited to cut into them. I wanted to really feature all these great colors.

Inspired by this print from the line…

And this amazing quilt by my mom (hi mom!)…

I decided to make something with circles. I cheated a bit and used my Sizzix die cutter to cut these out.

They are 1-1/2″ in diameter. Before I cut them, I iron Heat n Bond Lite to the back of my charms, as I am going to fuse the circles onto fabric before quilting.

I spent Wednesday playing with the layout. The neutral squares are 2″ x 2″ finished. I can’t wait to share the completed mini quilt with you soon!

Edges is now available in stores. You can find it at Fat Quarter Shop.

Tagged as:  Circles · Free Spirit Designer Solids · laura gunn · Michael Miller · Mini Quilt · modern quilt · Neutrals · Quilt Top

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This tutorial is a long time coming. Last year at the Sewing Summit, I taught some of you how to sew partial seams. I’ve been using this technique quite a bit lately, between writing the Starfall quilt pattern and my upcoming book. I hope you will find this tutorial helpful – if not today, then in the future when you run across a block needing this technique.

My usual disclaimer…this is how I personally sew partial seams. I am self taught, I’m sure there are a thousand ways to do this. This is mine.

The partial seams technique allows you to partially sew one piece of fabric to another, and then come back at a later point to finish the seam.

For example, at first glance this block looks like a log cabin. But upon closer inspection, you see that each of the “logs” is the same length (and longer than the center piece). Using partial seams, you can easily sew this together.

If you’d like to work along with this tutorial, cut 1 square and 4 strips as listed below. (These are the cut sizes, not the finished sizes.)

Center Square – Cut (1) 4-1/2″ x 4-1/2″
Side Rectangles – Cut (4) 1-1/4″ x 5-1/4″

1. You can start on any side of the block. I started on the left side and worked clockwise. Place your left strip, right side together with the center block. Align the top edges. As you can see, the strip will hang off the bottom of the block.

2. Sew your seam down the block, stopping and backstitching about 1″ before the end of the square.

Your block should look like this so far:

Press your seams as desired.

3. When you lay your top rectangle against the top edge of the block, you should notice it is now the exact length of the block.

4. Right sides together, sew the top strip on as normal.

Press your seams.

5. Repeat this usual piecing process for the right and bottom strips.

6. Now we are ready to finish the original seam. Fold your unsewn left rectangle back over the sewn block, aligning the unsewn edge. Pin into place.

Starting where you backstitched in Step 2, finish sewing down the seam to complete it. Press your seams.

Congratulations! You just finished your first partial seam block!

Tagged as:  Partial Seams · quilt block · Technique · Tutorial

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Welcome to the May edition of the Great Big Giveaway Day! This is the time of the month where many of my sponsors offer great prizes for lots of you to win. This month we have seven great prizes for seven lucky winners!

1. This month, I am giving away 3 charm packs of Full Moon Lagoon, courtesy of Andover Fabrics. I’ll pick 3 winners and each person will get 1 charm pack. I also am giving away a copy of the latest issue of Quiltmaker’s 100 Blocks, vol 7. That will go to another lucky winner!

2. ChristaQuilts is giving away one of her 8 fat quarter color bundles (value $22.95). Winner’s choice! As a special for all my readers she’s also offering a coupon for 10% off any one order, no matter how large or small. Just use code FRESH13 at checkout for your discount.

3. Connecting Threads is offering one lucky winner three solid fabric charm packs; one berry patch, one foliage, and one oceanfront. Each of the samplers has 24 fabrics.

4. Moona Fabrics is giving away a fat quarter bundle of “Urban Mod” by Art Gallery Fabrics – 10 pcs included are from the Street Siren palette – shades of aqua and citrus in delicious modern designs.

5. Contemporary Cloth is offering a $20 gift certificate so you can do some shopping! I’m drooling over the new Oakshott Cottons in the shop!

50% off shipping domestic and international during the Giveaway – just
type 50ship into the comments of the check-out form, we will refund you when we ship.

6. Southern Fabric is giving away a $25 gift certificate. There’s a lot of new fabric to choose from in the shop – Riley Chevron, Pirate Matey’s, 2wenty Thr3e, One for the Boys and Boho.

Right now there is also 30% off Lark Yardage by Amy Butler, Freshcut yardage by Heather Bailey, and All Caravan Precuts. 20% off Funky Monkey and Coquette.

7. I Don’t Do Dishes is giving away 2 yards of fabric – winner’s choice!

This month is the shop’s 1 year shopiversary. To celebrate, use code ONEYEAR for 15% off your order total through the month of May.

8. LiMa Sews is offering a fat quarter bundle of Tsuru (12 fqs/3 yds). I just love this new collection!

9. Fresh Modern Fabric is giving away a custom fabric set, the Spring Thing Fat Quarter Bundle. Such inspiring colors.

To enter, just leave one comment. There will be one winner per shop (except for my giveaway which will have 4 winners). I will randomly pick the 12 winners Friday evening, May 10th. I’m also linking up to Sew Mama Sew’s Giveaway Day.

Good luck everyone!

++ Closing comments! I’ll pick and notify the winners this weekend – stay tuned! ++

Here are the lucky winners, picked from Random.org.

#74 – Elizabeth
100 Blocks Magazine from me

#170 – Andrea Nelson
Full Moon Lagoon Charm Pack from Andover

#271 – Irelle
Full Moon Lagoon Charm Pack from Andover

#291 – Amber
Full Moon Lagoon Charm Pack from Andover

#367 – Kathy Gordon
Fat Quarter Color Bundle of your choice from Christa Quilts

#435 – Kelly
$20 gift certificate from Contemporary Cloth

#543 – Amy
Fat quarter bundle of “Urban Mod” from Moona Fabrics

#624 – Kassi McKey
Three solid fabric charm packs from Connecting Threads

#795 – Carly Ann
$25 gift certificate from Southern Fabric

#800 – Anna
2 yards of fabric – winner’s choice – from I Don’t Do Dishes

#1003 – Lady J
Fat quarter bundle of Tsuru from LiMa Sews

#1072 – Emily Becker Bruzzini
Spring Thing Fat Quarter Bundle from Fresh Modern Fabric

Congratulations everyone! I will be emailing each of you. Thanks for visiting everyone!

Tagged as:  Great Big Giveaway Day

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Don’t worry, I didn’t just whip this quilt up in the last few days. (You probably figured that out based on the weather in the photo here.) Last December, I had the great opportunity to make a new, larger version and pattern of my baby Starfall quilt for Modern Quilts Unlimited, Spring 2013 issue.

I originally made this quilt for the class I co-taught at the Sewing Summit – Shapes and Angles. This quilt was an example of what you can make using the Partial Seams technique. (Speaking of…I do plan on *finally* putting up a tutorial for partial seams very soon.)

I fell in love, hard, with Denyse Schmidt’s Chicopee collection last year. So much so, that I made this second quilt out of the same fabrics. I mixed in a few fabrics from her DS Quilts Collections from JoAnns and one perfect green print from Anna Maria Horner’s Good Folks collection.

The background is all various shades of neutral fabrics, from Free Spirit Designer Solids and Moda Bella Solids.

The finished quilt measure 60″ x 72″ and I quilted it with straight lines, 1/2″ apart. As usual, that took awhile but was more than worth it in the end.

I definitely recommend picking up the magazine – not just for my quilt but for all the others inside. It’s full of beautiful patterns by all sorts of names you will probably recognize (Rossie Hutchinson, Patty Sloniger, Patty Young, Elizabeth Dackson, Victoria Findlay Wolfe and many others) and a great article about Negative Space by Jacquie Gehring.

I believe subscribers already should have their copies, and you will be able to find it at shops soon (if not already).

Tagged as:  Anna Maria Horner · Denyse Schmidt · Free Spirit Fabrics · Lap Quilt · Moda · modern quilt · Modern Quilts Unlimited · Modern Traditionalism · Partial Seams · straight line quilting

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