Charm Jelly Roll Friendship Quilt Tutorial & Simply Color Giveaway

My mom, Grandma Jane, is back with another one of her wonderful quilting tutorials and a fabulous giveaway of V & Co's new line for Moda 'Simply Color'. Take it away Mom.....

 

I don’t like goodbyes and I had a tough one a few weeks ago when I had to say goodbye to a dear friend and co-worker who moved. Lori and I had worked side by side for almost 12 years and she was a part of my day to day work life in a big way! We worked so closely together on projects through the years that we were almost like an old married couple who begins to finish each other’s thoughts and sentences. Crazy, I know but it was a comforting feeling to work with someone who I knew so well!

Besides being incredibly smart and talented in the work setting, Lori is a woman of great personal strength, faith and integrity. She always made me laugh, (many times to the point of tears), with her stories about her family and kids. We shared lots of sad tears too, as we both have lost our precious mothers in recent years. She knew immediately what I was feeling when I said I missed my mother and she could say just what I needed to hear at that moment. I knew I wanted to make her a quilt as a goodbye gift—what better way to surround a good friend with a warm hug even when she is far away!

The cheery, happy colors of the new line, Simply Color by V and Co, were perfect! I chose the green, blues and greens for Lori’s quilt. I am going to save the orange, pink, gold and purple for another project.

Precuts of a charm pack and jelly roll come together so easily for this quilt. This finished throw size quilt measures 50 inches by 60 inches.

Choose 20 charms you want to use and pair up with 20 of the jelly roll strips, making sure you have good contrast between the charm and the jelly roll strip.

Cut off selvages for each strip. Stack two strips to speed up cutting.

Cut each folded jelly roll strip into a 5 inch strip and a 9 inch strip. Each strip gives you two 5 inch and two 9 inch pieces. Set aside the remainder 15 inch piece to use for a piano key pieced wide border.

Sew the 5 inch strips to the bottom and top of the charm. Press. Sew the 9 inch pieces to the sides. Press.

Trim each block to 9 inches. Arrange blocks in rows of 4 blocks x 5 blocks.

I don’t have pictures of the sashing steps but it is easy….First, cut (49) 2” x 9” sashing strips.

Sew vertical sashing strips to the sides of the blocks in each row of 4 blocks. (5 sashing strips in each row).

Cut (30) 2” x 2” cornerstones and sew to horizontal sashing strips. Start and end with the small cornerstones. (4 sashing strips in each row).

Sew the long horizontal cornerstone/sashing strips to the vertically sashed rows, matching seams carefully. Sew rows together.

Sew narrow border strips (1 ½ inch wide) to bottom, top and sides.

Arrange the extra 15”strip pieces together in a pleasing color combo, and sew strips together in sections. I used some extra jelly roll strips and added in some strips of the same white that I used for the sashing to get the length I needed. You will need 21 piano keys on the bottom and top borders and 26 piano key pieces on the sides. You may need to play around with this to get the color arrangement and length you want.

Sub cut the sewn strips into 5 inch wide sections. You can cut the piano key border in more narrow sections if needed.

Use 5 x 5 inch squares as cornerstones for the border. If you cut the piano key border less than 5 inches, adjust the size of the squares. IE… if you are using a 4 ½ inch wide border, cut your border cornerstone squares 4 ½ x 4 ½ inches instead of 5 inches.

Sandwich, baste, quilt and bind. I quilted using straight lines both vertically and horizontally. (The binding fabric is from Amy Butler’s Lark and the backing is a JoAnn’s fabric). To view more of Grandma Jane's tutorials, including sandwiching, basting, quilting and binding, click HERE.

 Wash and dry so your quilt is all warm and snuggly and ready to be mailed off! 

How would you like to have some of the “Simply Color” fabric to make a special friend a simply wonderful quilt to show them how much you love and adore them?

Enter to win TWO CHARM PACKS AND A JELLY ROLL of "Simply Color" with a comment (or two, three or four).

To enter the giveaway, do one or all of the following (please leave a separate comment for each entry):

1. Tell us about that special friend or person in your life who helps you get through your day with lots of smiles and laughter.
2. Become an official follower of The Cottage Home Blog (Google Friend Connect, Email or RSS Feed).
3. Become a fan of The Cottage Mama on Facebook (click here).
4. Share this giveaway with your friends on Facebook or on your own blog.

Giveaway open to US Residents only.
Giveaway open until Thursday, September 20, 2012 at Midnight (CST).

So there you have it! There are four chances to enter to win and make your very own Jelly Roll Friendship Quilt.

What a blessing those friends are in our lives. Thank you, Lori, for all the laughter and even the tears we shared! Miss you lots!

Thanks for guest blogging, Mom ~ you are simply the best!

Eat Your Fruits and Veggies Half-Square Triangle Quilt Top

I just wanted to write a quick post to share my mom's Eat Your Fruits and Veggies Half-Square Triangle Quilt Top that she completed using half square triangles.  

If you missed her half-square triangle tutorial, you can check it out HERE.

Isn't it gorgeous?  I absolutely adore this quilt top.  I think it is so fresh and modern, yet with a fun 1950's retro feel.  'Eat Your Fruits and Veggies' is by Pat Sloan for Moda Fabrics.  We picked up some of this line at sample spree during Spring Quilt Market.  The yardage has not been released yet, it will be out in October 2012. So once Mom can get her hands on more of this fabric she can finish up this beauty.

Isn't it amazing the beautiful designs you can create with half-square triangles?

I think I'm hooked!

Eat Your Fruits and Veggies Half-Square Triangle Tutorial and Giveaway

My mom (Grandma Jane) is back today with another fun tutorial.  I am doing my best right now to balance keeping up with the blog, my Etsy shop, pattern sales and writing my book, but it is a lot....oh yeah, and my two most important jobs.....mommy and wife.  I know I wouldn't even have all of these amazing opportunities if it weren't for you guys, the readers of The Cottage Home blog, so I just want to make sure that you don't feel like I have left you hanging in the creative department (since a lot of what I'm working on can't be revealed until a later date). Thankfully, Mom has agreed to help lighten my load and guest blog more frequently with some quilting tutorials. Mom's are the best, aren't they?

And on top of her being so kind to put together these tutorials, she is offering a GIVEAWAY today that she put together all on her own.  How sweet is that?  So, make sure you check out at the bottom of this blog post for more information on how to enter!  Take it away, Mom........

Lindsay and I were lucky enough to be able to say hello to Pat Sloan at her booth at Quilt Market in Kansas City and see her new fabric line, “Eat Your Fruit and Veggies.”

At the time, I thought the line was really cute! I loved the name of the line and the inclusion of batiks with the more traditional prints was an interesting twist. I couldn’t resist ordering some of the charm packs (which do not include the batiks) and when they arrived at my doorstep, I went a little crazy. Usually with new fabric, I spend days or weeks (or months) trying to decide what to do with it but not this! I immediately knew that these darling charm packs with the bright, lively and happy colors were going to be made into half square triangles (HSTs) accented with white and I would decide the quilt details later. So there I was late at night immediately cutting white fabric squares and sewing away. I love the versatility of the simple HST and thought I would share how easy these are to make.

Cut your background fabric squares the same size as the charms—5” squares. I was using 2 charm packs of 42 so I cut 84 white background squares. This will make 168 finished 4 ½ inch HSTs.

With a pencil or marking pen, mark diagonal lines on the wrong side of the background fabric squares. I like to mark all the squares at once.

Place one charm square and back ground fabric with right sides together.

Stitch a scant ¼ inch away from the diagonal line on one side. This is where “chain-stitching” will come in handy. Don’t lift up the presser foot. Place another pair of a background square and a charm under the presser foot and keep stitching. Do not cut the thread. I stitched 15-20 pairs together at a time. You can do more or less.

Cut the thread and flip the squares around and chain stitch down the other side a scant ¼ away. Now you have a pile of all these little squares connected by two threads. Cut apart.

Place each square on your cutting board and line up your ruler with the drawn pencil line. Cut along this line with your rotary cutter to cut each square in half. Take care that you do not cut into the stitched lines.

 
Set your seams with your iron. Press open with the seam toward the darker fabric.

Square up the HSTs to 4 ½ inches. This takes some time but you will be glad you did it when you start to sew your squares together. Line up your 45 degree line along the diagonal seam and cut off the little bit on the right side. Turn your square with the newly trimmed edge to the bottom and measure again. Cut if needed.

Now the fun part—Look at all the designs you can do with the HST just by arranging the squares. 

 How about zigzags? Remember the ORANGE quilt I made for Savannah’s 4th birthday? 

Arrows 

  Triangles 

 Diagonals 

 Hourglasses 

 Pinwheels 

 These squares on point are fun, too! 

GIVEAWAY: I just have to share THREE of these happy little charm packs so you can get in on the HST fun. 

And while we are at it….I’m including this fun cookbook with fast and fresh recipes for all that wonderful summer produce that is available to us right now. 

Remember our mothers always told us, “Eat your fruit and veggies!” 

Enjoy! 

To enter this giveaway, leave a comment with your favorite HST design and your favorite summer fruit or veggie! 

Giveaway open to US Residents only.  Giveaway open until Wednesday, August 8, 2012 at midnight (CST)

PS: You can find more tutorials from Grandma Jane including her piecing, quilting and binding tutorials by clicking HERE.