Quilt Block Names

Have you ever wondered how quilt blocks are named?

As you look through a book with hundreds of quilt blocks, several interesting things pop up.  You will probably discover quilt blocks with a different design while having the same name.  Likewise, you will find quilt blocks that look the same yet have different names.

How did this happen?  And what is the inspiration for naming quilt blocks in the first place?  A study in history and understanding life in the early years of America are particularly useful to answer these questions.

Many quilts and quilt blocks reflected that religious devotion.  “World Without End,” a quilt made during the Revolutionary time period, is a name lifted from the Book of Common Prayer.  It was, and still is, a phrase familiar in every church, regardless of creed.

In addition, early Americans were also very politically minded. And women, even though they couldn’t vote, were acutely aware of the importance of the politics of the day.

Even naming a quilt block stirred controversy.  A block named “Whig Rose” and “Democrat Rose” created a debate as to which was the correct name – a debate not settled, maybe even today.

The trades and occupations of the time also offered inspiration for quilt names. “The Anvil,” “The Carpenter’s Wheel,” “The Churn Dash,” and “The Water Mill” all came from women’s familiarity with old-time callings.

Many designs were specific to their community of origin.  And as they migrated away from the community, their form changed.

Because there were no printed patterns at the time, replication of the design relied on copying the pattern by looking at an existing quilt, remembering the design having seen it previously, or understanding a verbal description of the quilt block.

However the blocks were designed and named, there are thousands of them, ranging from easy to sew to very difficult to piece together.

You’ll find pictures of some of these quilt blocks in addition to more information about how blocks have been named over the years:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/articles/4022-origin-of-quiltblock-names.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

How to Quilt Weekly News and Machine Quilting Gloves

Now that our Thanksgiving weekend is over, it’s time to get ready for the year end holidays.

To help with your quilting and gift-giving, our brand new DVD Mentor, Creative Binding Techniques, is still available with no additional shipping cost.  But, today, November 30, is the last day to get in on this deal.

This is one of our most popular items, and you can easily combine it with The Ultimate How to Bind a Quilt DVD Mentor for an even greater value.

Midnight tonight is the end of the Free Shipping discount, so check it out before this deal ends.  You’ll find a link in the newsletter, along with more information about what’s included.

The Stack-n-Whack quilt is coming along nicely.  Last week, I finished layering and quilting all the blocks, and am now ready to begin sewing them together.  Since this is also a Quilt as You Go project, it’ll be fun watching the quilt get finished quickly.

I’m still deciding whether to add sashing between the big blocks, but I’m sure once they are sewn together it will be an easy decision.

This week we are featuring machine quilting gloves.  Although I can’t explain why these handy gloves work, they do.  And all of my machine quilting – whether it is a large quilt or small – is done using these gloves.

Also in this week’s newsletter, you’ll find brand new free quilt block patterns:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/newsletter/doubleanchor.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

a Stack and Whack Quilt Project

Since the Fat Quarter quilt is now finished, it’s time to begin a new quilting project, and next on the list is a Stack’n'Whack quilt.

This is a very popular type of quilt to make, since cutting the fabric is really easy.

The technique I will follow is to stack 4 squares of fabric, cut the patches and then switch pieces among the blocks, creating a different look for each block.

That being the process, I decided that using Layer Cake fabrics would shortcut the fabric cutting even more.

For those unfamiliar with Layer Cake fabric, it is simply a stack of fabric squares – usually 40 – 42 squares, each 10 inches.

Some quilt shops cut the fabric, but I found an interesting collection at Rosie’s Calico Cupboard, and decided to use it. The collection is one made by Moda, and is a Civil War assortment.

This is going to be a live project in www.TheQuiltingCoach.com which means that each week, you will get detailed step-by-step instructions for making the quilt.

Stack and Whack fabric

 

Freshening Your Quilts

Double Anchor Quilt Block

Caring for quilts can be a bit challenging.

Washing an antique quilt with laundry detergent and water is probably not the best idea.  Often detergents will damage the fabric or batting; and sometimes washing quilts can cause the dyes in the fabrics to bleed and run into other patches – which can be especially disappointing if the quilt is an heirloom.

Sometimes a quilt doesn’t need a full wash, though.

If a quilt has been folded on a closet shelf or you just rescued it from a thrift shop, antique store or garage sale, maybe it just needs a little fluffing up.  Maybe the quilt isn’t dirty; it is just crying out for a little freshening – without soap and water.

It’s a simple task and just requires a little fabric softener sheet and your drier.

You’ll find all of the details here:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/articles/4021-fluffing-quilts.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

Appliqué the Easy Way

If you are anything like I am, hand turn appliqué causes some trouble.  It’s not that I want to avoid the work, it’s just that my eyesight isn’t what it used to be, and hand turning those tiny seam allowances while attaching appliqué pieces is a challenge I’d rather avoid.

Plus, many quilters are faced with arthritis, making hand stitching more difficult, especially when you are working in small spaces or turning corners and making those sharp points.

Yet there are alternatives to hand turn appliqué, making it easy while still being beautiful and adding that “spark” to your quilt.

Way back “when,” I made many baby quilts using a simple zigzag stitch on my sewing machine.  It was a tight stitch, creating somewhat of a bump around the edge of the appliqué piece.  You probably remember seeing this type of appliqué – it’s been around for ages.

At the time, it was the only way I knew how to do machine appliqué, and it is still a good option.

However, as I have come to realize, when you have light interfacing on the back of the fabric, the edges won’t generally fray.  Therefore, you can widen the stitch, eliminating the unsightly bump while still attaching the piece securely to your quilt top.

Some sewing machines do a blanket stitch, which is also an option.  Or, you could choose another embroidery-type stitch to use around the appliqué piece to secure it to your quilt top.

Years ago, quilting daughter Stephanie took a workshop where she was shown how to simply machine stitch a straight stitch around appliqué pieces.  This also is a great option, and it is the method I recently used on a Moon and Stars trapunto piece.

Placing a light interfacing on the back of a simple circle, then straight machine stitching the circle into the center of a square is much easier than piecing a circle as if it were part of a Drunkard’s Path quilt block.

Oh, light interfacing – I use it on all appliqué pieces that are not hand-turned; you can’t really tell and it makes the sewing much easier.

Another method of avoiding hand-turned appliqué is to finish the entire appliqué piece, sew a backing on it, turn it right side out, and then sew the finished piece onto the quilt.

The advantage of this is that it adds some additional dimension, since you have two layers of fabric on top of your quilt top plus the seam allowances that are folded inside.  This piece can be either machine stitched or hand stitched onto your quilt top.

For other alternatives and to get more details about these techniques, visit:

http://how-to-quilt.com/articles/2044-applique-quilts.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

Black Friday or Fun and Games

Black Friday always sounded rather depressing to me.  That was until I learned that Black Friday was named that because it is the day when many retailers finally show a profit for the year – thanks to all of the shoppers on the day after Thanksgiving.

Once you have finished your contribution to the retailers’ profits, it may be time to think about holiday parties.

Maybe your quilting friends are thinking about getting together for the holidays – or possibly you already have a date, just not a real plan for the party.  Or maybe your quilting guild is planning a get-together, and is still looking for some fun activities.

Utah Star Quilt Block

A party with quilters should mean quilting goodies. Quilting-related games and activities are fun and easy to do.  As long a folks are there for fun, there is fun and quilting rewards to be gained.

How about a bobbin race?  Paint bobbins different colors, so they are easily identified, line them up and roll them from start to finish.  First one to the finish line wins!

Or maybe a thimble race?  Carry a thimble in a spoon – spoon in mouth – to make it a little more interesting!

And with games come prizes.  Prizes can easily come from your stash in the form of fat quarter stacks; or from your endless supply of quilt patterns – after all every quilter loves patterns.

As we get ready for the year-end holidays, it’s a good idea to take time for some fun.  For more ideas, visit:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/articles/4020-holiday-quilt-parties.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

Happy Thanksgiving and Tips for Machine Quilting

Happy Thanksgiving from the How-to-Quilt.com family!

For many, today is a time to relax and enjoy time with your families. It’s like the calm before the end of the year holiday activities.

For me, this is a slight departure from my normal Thanksgiving.  Quilting daughter Stephanie and her friend, Cam, are here in San Diego spending Thanksgiving with her dad and his family.  They’re also spending time with m. mouse – who really appreciates the company (and his every-18-hours insulin shot)!

Engineering son Bubba is cooking a fabulous crown roast dinner – with all the trimmings – at his place in Midland, Michigan, and has invited a few close friends to share his tasty treats.

And I am visiting my friend, Jim, and his sons in Los Angeles, enjoying Thanksgiving treats as well as a dose of football.

Although spread out across the country, we will be thinking of each other and YOU!

We are having a great year here at How-to-Quilt.com, and continue to appreciate your kind support.  And to continue with our quilting tip of the day, today’s topic is about starting and stopping your quilting stitches.

When I began quilting, a friend told me that the way to start and end my hand quilting stitches was to just loop the stitch around in place several times – kind of like stitching in place, only with a hand needle and thread.

Even though I thought it looked awkward (and frankly bad), I followed her directions.  After all, she was a home economics teacher and quilter, and I was just a beginning quilter – what did I know compared to her?

Not long after that, I took a class from Sharyn Craig who showed me a much better method for starting and stopping hand quilting – by burying the knots inside the quilt.

This experience offered two extremely valuable lessons – one, how to actually start and stop hand quilting beautifully; and two, not every “expert” has the best method.

It’s easy to believe that there are “rules” about quilting, and if you break them somehow the quilting police will show up and confiscate your quilts and all of your quilting tools and supplies, preventing you from breaking the rules – or making any more quilts.

Wow!

After decades of quilting, I have discovered that for every quilter who has a particular rule, there are many quilters who have different rules about the same thing.

Ultimately, it is your quilt – make it the way you want to and use the techniques you find easy and that give you the results you want!  And starting and stopping machine quilting is just the perfect example of that.

A couple of years ago when machine quilting expert, Pam Bauer, joined us for our Eavesdrop on a Telephone Conversation, she shared her best method for hiding machine quilting knots inside a quilt.  Using her technique, you will not be able to see any of your machine quilting knots – and that is a wonderful thing.

What I discovered is that her method takes a bunch of extra time, and at this point in my machine quilting adventure, I need to spend more time stitching than tying knots.

So, I started using some alternative methods, including overlap stitching and stitching in place.

You’ll find more information about these techniques:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/articles/2313-machine-quilting-stitches.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

High Quality, Inexpensive Fabric

Going back to the beginning of patchwork quilting here in the US, you’ll find quilters using old, worn out clothing and other household sources of fabric (for example sheets and linens) for their quilts.

As soon as they were able, many quilters started buying new fabric for their quilts.  Sometimes limited by financial resources and other times limited by availability of new fabric, quilts were so important that quilters refused to be prevented from making their quilts.

Today things may be no different.

Yesterday's shirt can become tomorrow's quilt

The rising cost of fabric and the mess in the economy may be factors in your shopping, but how about the fun of discovering some unusual fabric hidden on the racks of your local thrift shop, or in the closets of your friends and family?

There are probably clothes that your friends and family don’t wear any more and would be happy to donate to you for a quilt.  How about the clothes that your kids have outgrown yet bring fond memories of sports events, trips, school events, or just everyday life?

These can be great sources of fabric for quilts. Plus, they make lasting memories of fun times together.  And it’s really easy to cut them up and make patches.

Bonnie K. Hunter is a longtime quilter who specializes in making quilts from clothing and other recycled fabric.  Recently she was a guest for our Eavesdrop on a Telephone Conversation, and she had some fantastic ideas for recycling fabric:

http://how-to-quilt.com/articles/1034-recycle-fabric.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

Beautiful Machine Quilting ~ Webinar Today

Do you have unfinished quilts that are just waiting to be quilted?  Have you pulled them off the shelf, unfolded them, wished they would quilt themselves, and then folded them up and put them back on the shelf?

I do that.

As a matter of fact, I still have some quilts that are waiting to be quilted.  The difference is that now they are getting quilted because I have the courage to machine quilt them on my home sewing machine.

Courage…maybe.  But really it’s knowing a few simple techniques for machine quilting that make the difference between beautiful machine quilting and ordinary machine quilting.

You know ordinary machine quilting – the kind of machine quilting where you end up with puckers and tucks sewn in.  Usually on the back of the quilt – but they could be on the front.

Believe me, I feel your pain.  My machine quilting looked exactly like that.  As a matter of fact, you can see a picture of a small part of the back of one of my early machine quilting endeavors:

http://how-to-quilt.com/machine-quilting.php

But things are different now.

A while back, machine quilting expert, Pam Bauer, joined us for an Eavesdrop on a Telephone Conversation and shared her secrets for beautiful machine quilting.

I listened, and even tried one or two of her techniques on my next few quilts.

But recently I decided I would try more of her techniques to see if it would make a difference.

I shouldn’t have been too surprised – using more of her techniques made a huge difference in my machine quilting.  And it was really easy to start using her techniques.

During her Conversation, we learned about:

• Setting the tension on your sewing machine so your stitches are perfect
• Using some amazing gloves that allow you to guide your quilt as it is quilted
• The difference high quality thread makes, and which are the right threads to use
• How to handle the bulk of your quilt as you move it through your home sewing machine
• And tons more

This was a fantastic Conversation and everyone learned a bunch about machine quilting.  But that was a couple of years ago, and there were techniques I hadn’t tried, some I completely forgot about, and new ones I’ve stumbled across since then.

Since there is a huge interest in machine quilting on our home sewing machines, I decided to gather all of the best techniques I have learned and find useful and present them to our www.How-to-Quilt.com quilters.

Tonight is the night, and the fun begins at 5pm Pacific Time.

I will share the best of the best simple techniques for beautiful machine quilting.  And I will also share my super, special secret weapon for machine quilting.

This weapon has made all the difference in my machine quilting.  It took months for me to break down and try it, and now that I have, I will never be without it on a machine quilted quilt.

You’ll hear all of my easy and best techniques during our Conversation and webinar today, so I hope you will join us:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/machine-quilting.php

If you can’t join us, you can reserve a CD recording of the entire call plus the DVD with all of the video clips.

Happy Quilting!

Penny

 

When Your Stitches Just Aren’t Right

If you are anything like I am, every so often you end up ripping out stitches.  It’s inconvenient and disappointing, but it happens.  And when it does, it’s nice to have a good tool to work with.

I have mostly given up on the normal-looking seam rippers, and for years just used my embroidery scissors for removing stitches.  They are really pointed and sharp.  I just cut every 4th or 5th stitch, pull the fabric pieces apart and, magically, the stitching comes out.

The problem with that is that the fabric stretches, and when I am working on bias edges of my patches, sometimes it takes a heroic effort to get the fabric back in shape.

Havel's Seam Ripper

On a trip to my local quilt shop, I ran across a seam ripper that was a little different.  This one looked like some kind of surgical knife.  It has a thin, flat blade and all kinds of warnings about how sharp it is.  Although it was a little pricey, I decided to try it out.

It is one of the more amazing tools I have run across recently.  This seam ripper is so sharp it glides through seams, cutting every stitch instantly.

You do need to be a little careful so you don’t cut the fabric.  But this is the best seam ripper I have seen, and much better than my scissors.

Like they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, and I’ve done a short video showing how it works:

http://www.how-to-quilt.com/articles/6025-seam-ripper.php

Happy Quilting!

Penny