::A Little Rain, A Little Shine::

The day started with rain and ended with a little sun.

It seems fitting this summer in Seattle to be appliqueing a raindrop here and there.

My Sheets of Rain whole cloth quilt has a few now and has become my companion as I sit on the sidelines at various kid summer lessons.

I have a puddle full of raindrops made to add.

I’ve enjoyed picking the scraps from my favorite long gone fabrics for each raindrop.

You can see the process I use to applique them here.

Those appliques come in handy for covering up the free-motion-quilting mistakes.

I love the little bit of shine the yellow flannel adds.

Here’s what it looks like so far.

I’m looking forward to seeing how the rain shower grows.

Though I’m far from ever teaching free-motion quilting I see this as an addition to my whole cloth quilt class with applique potential follow up.

My students and I had a load of fun in my whole cloth quilt class last month.  I made this chevron style one right along with the students to show them the various steps.

The orange stitches sunk into the pink flannel nicely.  I can’t recall the maker of this flannel, but it is super buttery and thick.

The stripe and binding fabric are old Amy Butler’s that had lost their appeal for making their way into a pieced project, I’d just had them too long I guess, but worked perfectly in this quilt.

Now I have another to add to this one as my class examples or for that next special baby.

I’ve enjoyed making these so much that I created a Whole Cloth Quilt Group to showcase them.  I hope if you make one you’ll add it.

Now I have plans for one on my bed!

 

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::Sheets of Rain Quilt::

Ever since Crazy Mom Quilt’s Ticker Tape Quilt I’ve had a quilt idea in my head.  A quilt with “ticker taped’ raindrops.  So appropriate for Seattle.

However, over the year or so the quilt idea has evolved from a ‘quilt as you go’ quilt with appliqued raindrops to a free motion quilt with a continuous raindrop stitch AND raindrop appliques.

My plan is to not go through all three layers of the quilt when ladder stitching the raindrops down, so that the continuous raindrop stitching is all that shows through on the back.

The raindrop stitches are complete and the binding is stitched down, all that’s left are the appliqued raindrops.  I’m thinking mostly primary color here.

It’s like a thunder storm on the front (which rarely occur here in Seattle and I miss them) and a sunny day on the back.

So today I made the raindrops.  Sorted through the scrap bins, picking out the favorites.

My Mom taught me how to make appliqued shapes with templates so you don’t have raw edges (which just didn’t seem practical for a baby quilt needing to be washed often).

If you haven’t done this before, draw your shape on paper or wax paper and glue it or iron it (if you use wax paper) to cardboard.  Cut it as cleanly as you can.  Use a nail file to smooth edges if needed.

Cut around your raindrop or other curved shape giving yourself about a 1/4″ seam, or trace around the shape on the wrong side of your fabric and cut a 1/4″ away from the line.

Baste stitch around your shape about an 1/8″ from the cut edge, starting and ending your thread tails on the curved end AND on the same side of fabric.

Pull on the strings.  I didn’t do it, but if you place the basting closer to the template when ironing it will help create a smoother curve (so “they” say).

I starch both sides and iron as I’m pulling those strings.  I give the strings one wrap around a finger when I pull so it’s taunt.  If you’ve glued paper on to your template then you might want to face it down or it mucks all off with the starch.

Traditionally or by what I’ve been taught at least, you iron the top tip or a point down the middle first and than cross over the sides…make sense?

As you can see, I don’t do that.  I just do a straight cross over.  I occasionally clip some of the fabric out to reduce bulk.

Whatever, they look fine.

Pull out the template and give them a final press right side up, giving a tuck to anything that’s come out of wack when removing the template.

Aren’t they delicious?

Then clip the threads and pin that sucker down.

I actually have a use for those pins that will make you blind.

When free motioning I would try to correct a raindrop ‘gone bad’ by adding an echo, but if that didn’t go so well I looked for those spots to add a raindrop applique.

Uh oh, looks like this quilt might have a load of raindrops.  It’s kinda been one of those rainy years.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

P.S.  The sun shone today.

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out of print destash

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