Hiring a Longarm Quilter: Footnotes Edition

If you haven’t checked out Hiring a Longarm Quilter: An In-Depth Guide that I put together with Suzy Williams of Suzy Quilts, you definitely should! It’s packed with lots of information you may find interesting or helpful, hopefully both.

Did any particular project catch your eye? The nature of my job requires collaboration. The following are my photos of quilting on other makers’ tops! Here’s a list of––and links to––makers, patterns, & pantographs.

Meghan Buchanan of Then Came June made this patchwork quilt with her 12 year old cousin!

Pantograph: Daisy Tile by Karen Hogan

Fabrics: Alison Glass

Maker: Chelsea Wiehl of The Good Nest

Pattern: Meadowland by Then Came June

Pantograph: Baptist Fans E2E by Three Sisters Fabric

Maker: Jessica Plunkett of Maeberry Square

Pattern: In the Right Direction by Jessica Plunkett of Maeberry Square

Maker: Lindsey Neill of Pen + Paper Patterns

Pattern: Sweet Treat by Lindsey Neill of Pen + Paper Patterns

Maker: Brenda of Eye Candy Quilts

Pattern: Nene by Eye Candy Quilts

Pantograph: Starlight by Karlee Porter Designs

Fabric: Quantum by Giucy Giuce for Andover

Maker: Bobbi Dougherty

Pattern: Circle of Friends

Pantograph: Overlapping Crop Circles by Jessica Schick

Maker: Jessie Zeigler (that’s me and you are on my website!)

Pattern: Cora by Jessie Zeigler of Threaded Quilting Studio

Custom quilted by me.

Maker: Meghan Buchanan of Then Came June

Pattern: Meadowland by Then Came June

Pantograph: Lindsey, The Remix (custom made by me)

Maker: Alison Gamm

Pattern: Star Bright Star White by Rebecca Bryan of Bryan House Quilts

Pantograph: Baptist Fan E2E by Three Sisters Fabric

Maker: Stacy Stillions

Pattern: this is the back, but pattern is Mini Modern Heart by me

Pantograph: Baptist Fan E2E by Three Sisters Fabric

Maker: Karen Henderson

Pattern: Sandia by Kristi Schroeder of Initial K Studio

Pantograph: Soho by Sarah Ann Meyers

Maker: Stephanie Williams

Pattern: North Star by Emily Dennis of Quilty Love

Pantograph: Hammersmith by Keryn Emmerson

Maker: Brittany Lloyd of Lo & Behold Stitchery

Pattern: Celtic by Lo & Behold Stitchery

Pantograph: Pineapple Skin by Karlee Porter

Maker: Lindsey Neill of Pen + Paper Patterns, photo also courtesy of Lindsey

Pattern: Vegas Wedding Quilt by Lindsey Neill of Pen + Paper Patterns

Pantograph: Lindsey custom designed by me

The ins/outs of my longarm quilting business

Hello, friends! I’ve been featured online and in print publications lately and I wanted to give you some links to more information if you’re interested.

Suzy Quilts - in depth guide to hiring a longarm quilter, and me specifically

Quilts and More - new quilt pattern

APQS - the business of longarm quilting

Adel Living - local publication with a peek into my studio

Fierce Feathered Star One Block Lap Quilt

I’d love to show you how to use my Fierce Feathered Star block in this lap sized layout! It’s kind of fun only making one main block and getting a whole quilt out of it! :)

Let’s start with the fabric requirements using the 2-tone option you see here. I bought 3 yards of each light and dark fabric and had enough for the binding and part of the pieced back.

Quilt Center:

Make the 36” Fierce Feathered Star as per the pattern directions.

Setting Triangles:

Cut two 27” squares out of light fabric.

Fold the square in half diagonally as shown below, aligning all edges.

Use a long ruler to cut the large folded square in half, yielding 2 large half-square triangles.

Repeat with the other 27” square.

Very gently crease the bottom edge of a large triangle to find its center.

Find the midpoint of the Fierce Feathered Star block by folding it in half and marking its center.

Align the light triangle RST atop the FFS as shown below, matching the midpoints of each.

Carefully pin from the center outward. Be really careful not to pull or stretch the bias edge of the triangle.

Sew using 1/4” seam. Press (I like to press open).

Repeat with the other 3 triangles along the other 3 sides of the center block.

When all the setting triangles are sewn into place, the FFS will “float” in the center, meaning the center block does not extend all the way to the edge. As you can see in the photo below, there is a bit of a margin there.

First border:

Cut eight 2.75” x WOF strips of dark fabric.

Sew strips end-to-end (RST) in pairs to make four border strips. Press seams.

Trim two of the borders to 52”.

Tip: When I have to measure and cut pieces that are longer than my 36” cutting mat, I place a pin to mark the end of my mat (in this case 36”).

Then, I slide the pin to the 0” mark of my mat and do the math to figure out where I need to make the cut.

In this example 36” + 16” = 52”, so I make my cut at the 16” line of the mat.

To get nice, straight borders that don’t wave, ALWAYS measure & cut to the exact measurement first, pin and then sew to the quilt top.

Align border strip RST to one side of the quilt. At this point, the top is still square so it doesn’t matter which side you start with.

Pin each end of the border to the quilt top. Pin the center and continue pinning every few inches until the whole border is secured to the top.

Sew using 1/4” seam. Press.

Seam the 2nd border strip to the opposite side of the quilt top.

In the same manner as you attached the first two borders, cut the two remaining untrimmed border strips to 56.5” and sew to the other sides of the quilt.

Second border:

The second border is only applied to two (opposite) sides to make the quilt rectangular. The top and bottom border are each made of fourteen half-square triangles (HST).

Cut four 10” squares of each the light and dark fabric to make a total of 32 HST using the Magic 8 method. Refer to page 11 of the Fierce Feathered Star pattern if you need a reminder.

Press and trim 28 (the remaining 4 won’t be used) of the HSTs to 4.5” square.

Arrange and seam together as shown. Attach to top and bottom of the quilt.

Top border:

Bottom border:

That’s it! “Quilt as desired” and bind… as they say in the biz. :)

Snowflake QAL: Week Ten

Kelly Levant's quilt pictured here (her photo) called Summer Stars was recently accepted into Quilt Canada 2018! Congratulations, Kelly!

WEEK TEN!

Inspiration time! Kelly participated in the first Feathered Star QAL this summer. Just this week it was accepted into a juried show–her first! Well deserved, Kelly! We will be rooting for you this May!

Snowflake Sampler: assemble quilt top, p.62

Star Flurries: assemble quilt top, p. 39

Feathered Star Blizzard: assemble quilt top, p. 44

If you haven't removed your papers, I would highly suggest you do that before you sew any applicable sashing strips to your blocks before assembly. I think it is soooooo much easier to pick out papers block by block instead of having a whole lap of work to get through.

Refer to the pages of your pattern given above and complete the rest of the pattern!

OHMYGOSH, I'M GETTING SO EXCITED TO SEE YOUR TOPS!

Nagging reminder time! To get great results, go slow, take one step at a time, check and re-check your sewing in relation to the diagrams, PIN CAREFULLY AND FREQUENTLY, sew and press with care. 

You've got this!!

Snowflake QAL: Week Nine

Joan Cumming has been working ahead on her Blizzard quilt! Isn't it spectacular?!?! She added even more stars to make the whole top bigger. Beautiful!!

Welcome to Week Nine of the QAL!

Snowflake Sampler: two 36" Fierce Feathered Stars

Star Flurries: one 20" No Y Seam Feathered Stars or Fierce Feathered Stars (your choice of construction method)

Feathered Star Blizzard: two 16" AND two 8" No Y Seam Feathered Stars

Can you believe there is only one week left? Time flies when you're piecing one million tiny bits of fabric together... isn't that how the saying goes? ;)

Congratulations if you are caught up! Congratulations if you're still hanging in there! Congratulations if you're waiting for the right timing to dig in! The point is, you've challenged yourself to do a difficult thing and I admire that. It's so worthwhile to push yourself and learn new skills, I salute you!

Sampler folks: I have a video tutorial series now on how to construct the Fierce Feathered Star. If you feel safe and cozy within the confines of paper piecing (no shame in that) and are nervous about tackling the non-paper piecing star, watch the videos! They'll give you the boost you need to begin.

Next week, we'll sew our tops together! If you want to get yourself prepped, make sure all of your papers are removed. You could also begin cutting out any sashing strips if you have them (Sampler and Blizzard) and sewing them to the appropriate stars. Again, not part of the challenge this week, but if you're looking for ways to get ready, those are good places to start.

I cannot tell you how satisfying this is to seam together! FUN! This was my Sampler top from the first QAL I hosted last summer.

Hop on over to my closed Facebook group to join the discussion, share pictures, ask questions, get encouragement. We are a community and we'd love to help you out!

Snowflake QAL: Week Eight

Cara (@sew_colorado_quilting) is making beautiful progress on her Star Flurries quilt!

Welcome to Week Eight! 

Snowflake Sampler: two 20" No Y Seam Feathered Stars or Fierce Feathered Stars (your choice of construction method)

Star Flurries: one 20" No Y Seam Feathered Stars or Fierce Feathered Stars (your choice of construction method)

Feathered Star Blizzard: four 20" No Y Seam Feathered Stars

**NOTE** Last week I had originally challenged the Star Flurries participants to make two 20" blocks. I should have only had you make one. There are only 13 star blocks total, nine 20" stars and four 12" stars. Please adjust accordingly if you made 2 last week!

The 20" stars will be NEW this week for both the Sampler and the Blizzard folks. Those sewing the Sampler quilt will have the choice of whether or not to use paper piecing templates as per usual OR... maybe they'll will want to take a break from paper piecing and try the Fierce Feathered Star construction??? 

Stacy (@sgarrett0871) has all her Blizzard blocks neatly lined up and ready for action!

If you do plan to go "Fierce", try to be as exact as possible with cutting and with your 1/4" seam allowance. We've been paper piecing for so long that it might take an extra-focused effort to do conventional piecing again! :)

Other Fierce Feathered Star notes:

• It's very easy to get "turned around" when sewing the block components together, especially when it comes to the direction of the half-square triangle units. For as many times as I've made the blocks, I STILL match up my pieces to the pattern photos EVERY TIME to make sure I'm sewing them correctly.

• Pin a lot! I'm okay with being a broken record on this point, it's really important for matching points.

• I have a new instructional video series about how to make the Fierce Feathered Star! In the video, I demo making the 36", but the methods and steps are the same.

• Don't forget to take one step at a time. This isn't fast sewing, each block takes several hours to complete. Enjoy the process - you can do it!

Hop on over to my closed Facebook group to join the discussion, share pictures, ask questions, get encouragement. We are a community and we'd love to help you out!