Happy Moment #39: Finishing a Store Project!

It is always an honor for me when the awesome quilt shop I work at (Jackman's Fabrics in Fairview Heights!) trusts me enough to ask me to do a store display (and this project will also be used for our upcoming Holiday Expo -- click here for more info!). If you ever come into our store, you will notice an ever changing number of quilts and other quilt projects hanging up around our store among the fabulous array of high-end quilting fabric and other notions and cool sewing "things." We have some major talent in terms of folks who do these quilts. I would even say that coming to our store is like visiting a quilting museum -- the displays are that awesome!

In the two years I have worked there part-time, I have done a few displays (including the first stuffed animals I have ever made) but my latest project was the hardest I have ever done, pushing my own sewing skills even further. This project is by "Dreamy Quilts Patterns" and is called "Stars." What was going to make this challenging for me from the start was the preciseness of the quilt blocks themselves -- two different kinds of rustic stars that needed to be super 100% precise in order to actually look like stars by the time that I was finished. Click here for the pattern if you are interested in doing this yourself!

One of the challenges of this pattern was the number of pieces of fabric that I had to cut (and label) before I even started. As most quilters know, this part of a project is often the least "fun" -- lots of cutting and then sub-cutting (and I had to keep all the piles organized, not one of my strong suits). After two days of cutting fabric, I then spent a few days assembling the blocks (there were about 24 blocks and then about 4-5 blocks of "half" stars). When I got to this point, I had to figure out how I was going to to order the stars when I pieced the top -- I tried really hard not to put the same two colors next to each other -- this task took a bottle of wine to complete as I contemplated the arrangement. Here is what this process looked like by the end:

I forgot to mention that the fabric I got to use was unicorn-themed! The fabric is from Northcott and it is called "Unicorn Magic" -- the Fat Quarter Shop (click here) has some of it still in stock -- and we have the whole line at Jackman's (another good reason to come in the shop!).

Once I got the order figured out, then I pieced the whole front of the quilt together!

But I wasn't done with this quilt top yet! I still had to do something that I hadn't done before -- add some words with fusible web (and then sew it down). I haven't had a lot of experience with this but I used a light box I purchased (click here for the Amazon link) and after two tries (I did it backwards the first time!), I manage to get the letters done and then the words added to the front side of the quilt. It also took some time to get the words placed exactly like the pic on the front of the pattern (and getting them straight was a challenge!). The original idea was to blanket stitch around the letters but I was having such a hard time making this look "good" that I switched to a satin stitch that "fixed" my original attempts and made the letters pop better (I used a purple embroidery thread to add some "shine" which was an awesome idea from the folks at the store).

After getting this far, the beginning of the new school semester started to impinge on my time! I had to get syllabi ready for the new semester and everything that you think is going to take one hour ended up taking triple that time. This weekend, I was finally able to get the quilting done (it takes me a whole day to just sandwich and quilt the whole thing).

One of the last steps is to make the binding and then sew one side of it on to the front side of the quilt. I spent a few hours watching a movie with Jim yesterday afternoon while I hand sewed the back of the binding to the back of the quilt (that is why the clips are there -- to keep the binding in place until I sew it down by hand).

Here is the finished project!

The second two pictures show the backing fabric (which I love!) -- I took a close-up so you could see the glitter in the fabric (on the hooves, the horn and then mane!).

I am always happy when I get trusted with a project like this because I still feel like a beginner when it comes to quilting. I am happy with the end result but (1) I need to work even harder to smooth down the backing when I do the quilt sandwich -- I super taped that sucker down on the floor but there are still a few spots where the fabric folded a little; (2) I need to learn how to free motion quilt better than just doing random circles (which you can sort of see in the close-up of the backing); and (3) I need to work on being more precise with my cutting (I see some minor mistakes even though I used my seam ripper a lot when I was piecing the blocks).

But I am happy with the final result! It looks like a quilt! In this year of finding things that make me happy, I know that I am super pleased when I make quilts and other sewing projects. I'm still not sure what it is about sewing, but something about doing this sort of stuff makes me smile and feel good about myself. :)