Category Archives: Quilt Therapy Lesson

Tutorial Tuesday: Sew N’Slash “LOVE Letters” Table Runner

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This is a super-simple, no-pattern-necessary tutorial on creating and piecing ABCs out of quilt fabric, the Sew N’Slash™ way.

LoveLetters

Fabric:

  • TWO (2) fat quarters
  • 1/2 yard backing fabric

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These are the two fat quarters I chose.

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All of my letters will have at least one piece of fabric in them that is 1 1/2″ (finished) wide.  I begin by envisioning my finished letters.  I will use the green fabric as two of the letters and the red fabric for the other two letters in the word LOVE.

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Cutting out the two parts to the letter L.  This is a creative project.  There is no wrong way to make letters – it’s up to your creative mind!  I don’t even have a size for my letters determined – they will be the size they end up being and then I will piece them together.

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Now it’s time to cut out the background fabric for my L.

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Sew and press them together.

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Let the sewing begin!

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The letter itself is done, now it’s time to Sew N’Slash™ the rest of the border fabric for the L.  To get started, I eyeball the length and/or width to add to the letter blocks.  Once the fabric is sewn on, I slash it to whatever size I want.

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The L is completed!

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Using the same no-pattern Sew N’Slash™ method, I begin putting the V together

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Here, I visualize putting my V together just as you would using the paper-piece method of quilting – except without the paper.  It’s all in my head!  LOL

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This is the V before I slash it.

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The first slash is cutting everything away that is to the right of my seam line.

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Then it’s time to slash the two ends so they are straight.

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I *never* throw away the scraps that are created when I Sew N’Slash™ unless the pieces are too small to use elsewhere.  You never know when you are going to need a portion of the scraps to fill in a spot.  I will complete a Sew N’Slash™ project and then throw away any unusable scraps or sort the usable ones into bins.

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My V is ready!

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Continue with the same process except now I change my fabrics around – the red will become the letters and the green will become the background.

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My O is ready!  Where it looks like I’ve spent a lot of time measuring and cutting and sewing, I’ve completed this letter in less than 10 minutes, using my Sew N’Slash™ method.  I just square everything up at the end so all of my letter blocks can be sewn together.

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This is the completed “LOVE Letters”, sewn together and squared up.

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And this is the completed table runner!  Go forth and Sew N’Slash™!


Tutorial Tuesday: Sew N’Slash Scrappy Pennant Points

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The purpose of making a scrappy quilt is…using up your quilt scraps.  Right?  Keeping that in mind, my tutorial today is doing just that – and ending up with some pretty rad quilt blocks, too!

I developed my Sew N’Slash™ method of making quilt blocks in 2009 and have had a blast employing it ever since.  It’s almost fool-proof and it makes putting quilt blocks together so much easier than all that precise measuring, cutting and piecing.  The key, with Sew N’Slash™ is all in the final block cuts.

Think of Sew N’Slash™ in terms of piecing a paper-pieced quilt block except without the paper.  That’s how I approach it when I use it.  Without further ado, let’s get started!

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Begin by choosing various fabric pieces for your blocks.  While these fabrics I’ve chosen are scraps, they are all from the same colorway.  That isn’t necessary.  The scrappier, the better!

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Determine the size you want to make your pennant point.  I decided on 60° angles and about 4 1/2″ unfinished height.

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Choose the fabrics you would like to flank your pennant point.  Lay them out with your pennant point to make sure your scrap is big enough, by length and width, to create your desired finished block size.  I found these two squares so cut them diagonally, corner-to-corner, ONE (1) time.  I only need ONE (1) green and ONE (1) blue triangle for a single Pennant Point block.

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Because I am dealing with triangles that are cut on the bias, I like to starch and press each piece of fabric before doing anything else, to reduce the chances of the fabric stretching.  Then, pin the green fabric to the pennant point and sew together with a 1/4″ seam allowance.  Once done, press toward the pennant point.

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Repeat the same sewing process to the opposite side of the pennant point (pins optional).

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Once pressed, this is what your pennant point looks like with the two flanks sewn on.

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It’s time to trim the excess fabric!  My unfinished block size is 3 1/2″ wide by 4 1/2″ long.  Using my rotating cutting board (such a quilt-fabulous invention!), I square up my block to my desired dimensions.

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After another quick spray of starch and pressing it with a hot iron, this is the finished Pennant Point block!  Repeat the process and make another one (or more).  It is always quicker to chain piece a number of blocks but if you are trying to perfect your own Sew N’Slash™ abilities, just make one or two at a time.  It does get much easier with practice!

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Ta-da!  Two Pennant Point blocks using my Sew N’Slash™ method.

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Pin the two Pennant Point blocks, right sides together, and sew them together with a 1/4″ seam allowance.

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This time, press the seams open.  It reduces the bulk for your finished Pennant Point block and makes sewing multiple blocks together a breeze without lumps and bumps.

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The finished Pennant Point block using my Sew N’Slash™ method.

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And this is an illustration of what a quilt top would look like if you wanted to create a quilt using Pennant Point blocks made with my Sew N’Slash™ method.  It definitely would be MUCH more fun with scrappier fabric choices.


Tutorial Tuesday: Half-Square Triangles

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Over and over again, half-square triangles (aka HSTs) are explained.  Over and over again, beginning quilters continue to have trouble making them.  I will add myself to debunk the HST myth.  It’s not magic, it’s just MATH!

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Start with two equal-sized squares*.  On the back side of the lightest square, draw a diagonal line, corner-to-corner, ONE (1) time.

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Diagonal line.

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With right sides together, sew 1/4″ on either side of the line you drew.

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Using a ruler and your rotary cutter, cut the square into triangles, ON the line you drew.

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Two triangles.

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Open them up and press toward the darkest fabric.  You have now made two HSTs!

*A little quilter’s tip – cut the squares a tad larger than your pattern calls for.  Once you have pressed your HSTs, you can then square them up to be the exact finished size your pattern requires.


Quilting Corrections

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I have been making a queen-size t-shirt quilt for a friend’s daughter and son-in-law.  Queen-size as in it covers a queen-size bed and has about a 10″ drop all the way around it.  It’s not only the largest quilt I’ve ever made, it is extremely heavy!  My longarm quilter, Meloney, did an amazing job of quilting it with small-ish curlycues – which is where the extra weight, compared to a larger longarm quilted pattern, comes from.

Unfortunately, she encountered an issue that I have to correct – *none* of which is her fault.  A few of the t-shirts are very saturated with screen printing.  So much so that she couldn’t even consider quilting on those shirts without causing damage to her longarm.

She made a suggestion as to how to correct the issue and I asked another respected quilter what her suggestion would be – and both agreed with each other so that’s what I’ll do.  You can see the issues below.  The white is the backing on the quilt and then the t-shirt photos follow the white quilted fabric photos.

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The correction will be done using a simple needle and thread and just tacking the t-shirts down (and hiding the thread in the batting), in as many places as necessary to keep the three quilt layers together for the long haul.  I love it that the fix is simple and love it even more when I can correct an issue without compromising the design of the quilt!


Geometric and Directional Fabric No-No

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All the quilting rage these days is to use geometric and directional fabric designs – now known as part of the modern quilt movement.  Mind you, there have been directional and geometric fabrics around for a long time, it’s just that a lot of the modern quilts are made with geometric and directional fabrics.  Sometimes though, this is not the best course of action for a beginning quilter.  A beginner can be as modern as they want…until they can’t.

When is that a problem?  Take a look at this quilt block:

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With the right fabrics (right being deemed by the modern quilt movement’s establishment) and colors, a simple log cabin quilt can become a thing of modern beauty.  Now take a closer look at the plaid red and white fabric strips.

I had been quilting for about 25 years when I made this quilt block.  And I made this “beginning quilter’s” mistake.  The lines on the fabric are not straight.

I can call this whatever I want – the fabric wasn’t printed straight on the grain, the fabric shifted when I cut it out, it’s handmade and looks handmade, etc. etc.  I can call it whatever I want to, but the truth is that I would never recommend this type geometric/directional fabric to a beginning quilter.  If a person who has been quilting for as long as I’ve been quilting cannot cut a straight line in the fabric, how can I expect a beginning quilter to do so?

Please remain calm.  This is not a post on bashing modern quilts.  It’s not a post on bashing fabric manufacturers.  This is a post outlining why I choose not to design quilts with geometric and/or directional fabrics – I design quilts for beginners and above!

If you are a beginning quilter and wish to make modern quilts, stick with a pleasing color palate without the geometric and dimensional fabrics.  You can grow into them as your quilting advances.  Or if you use those fabrics mentioned and your lines do not come out straight – go ahead and call your quilt a handmade modern quilt.