Holiday Gift Ideas - Quilted and Stitched Gifts

Yesterday I gave you some embroidered gift ideas. If hand embroidery isn't your cup of tea, you might want to make a quilted or stitched gift. If so, you'll enjoy these patterns:

Snow Cool is a quick appliqué wall hanging project using fusible web and it's FREE! Learn how to do this easy appliqué technique in Essential Guide To Fusible Web Appliqué.  

Snow Cool by Chatterbox Quilts uses hand embroidery and fusible web appliqué to create a small wall hanging.

Bundle Up is the perfect table runner or wall hanging, again created using fusible web appliqué. I've made this as a table runner and as a wall hanging: just change the orientation of the appliqués to create a vertical design. With its blustery theme, Bundle Up can decorate your house all through the winter.

Bundle Up by Chatterbox Quilts can be either a table runner or a wall hanging.

If you like circles, Bubbly Stripes is the pattern for you. This can also be either a table runner or a wall hanging. Change the look of Bubbly Stripes for the holiday season by creating it in Christmas or winter fabrics. Use the various decorative stitches on your sewing machine to finish the edges of the fusible web appliqué circles or stitch across the circles with decorative machine stitches to create ornaments from the circles.

Bubbly Stripes by Chatterbox Quilts would look great in seasonal fabrics with decorative machine stitching around the appliquéd circles.

For frosty appeal, create Snowflakes a' Fallin'. This is also a fusible web appliqué design by Chatterbox Quilts that can be either a table runner or a wall hanging - you don't even have to change the orientation of the snowflakes for this one. There is lots of opportunity for embellishment with this pattern, so get out your metallic threads and hot-fix crystals!

Snowflakes a' Fallin' by Chatterbox Quilts makes a lovely table runner.

If you're new to fusible web appliqué, enrol in my on-line course, Essential Guide to Fusible Web Appliqué to learn all about this easy appliqué technique.

Enrol in Essential Guide to Fusible Web Appliqué to learn how to do this fast technique.

 If you have stitchy friends who own a vintage sewing machine, they'll appreciate Vintage Sewing Machine Covers. This pattern includes a table runner just the right size for most vintage sewing machine cabinets as well as a bed extension cozy for the singer Featherweight sewing machine. Both of these are very easy and quick to make.

They might also appreciate the gift of an on-line course on how to repair, rejuvenate and care for their vintage sewing machine. The Joy of Vintage Sewing Machines teaches these skills and more as well as the pattern and instructions on how to create both of the projects in the Vintage Sewing Machine Covers pattern.

Learn about purchasing and rejuvenating a vintage sewing machine in The Joy of Vintage Sewing Machines.

If you're looking for a quick stitched project, these make wonderful gifts:

Myrtle is a little owl that is perfect for sewing friends to hold quilting or sewing supplies or just to keep them company in their studio. I like to create Myrtle using recycled suiting fabric. You might even find yourself making a second Myrtle just for you!

Myrtle by Chatterbox Quilts is a cute and helpful studio companion.

Use upcycled vintage linens to create detail on Myrtle's back.

With just a few supplies, you can create a project in the hoop. This is the quickest gift to whip up and it's so fun to embellish it to add that personal touch. Learn how to create the project in the hoop by watching the video below or on my Youtube channel.

Looking for a really quick gift - and no sewing. Create this quick project in a hoop and you'll be done in no time. Lots of embellishment opportunities with this project.

If you have any quick gift ideas for the holidays, I'd love to hear them. Please share them in the comments below.

Happy creating!

Class sale at Craftsy!

Just a quick note that Craftsy is having a HUGE sale. You can save up to 50% off any of their classes.

I've been enjoying several quilting classes lately. You might enjoy enrolling in them too, especially now with the reduced price.

I never thought learning about quilt bindings would be fun and interesting, but Susan Cleveland makes it so in her class, "The Perfect Finish: How to Bind a Quilt". You'll definitely want to check out this technique class.

I've also been enjoying learning with Debby Brown in her course, "Free Motion Quilting with Lines, Curves and Loops". Debby uses 5 letters to create stunning free motion designs and she makes it look so easy.

Enrol in great courses at fantastic prices - but only until November 1!

Creatively,

P.S. I am a Craftsy affiliate and receive compensation if you enrol using my links. This helps me to continue to create videos, tutorials and share with all of you. Thanks!

Telecast Thursday - Deconstructing Vintage Crochet

Welcome to another Telecast Thursday! Today I'm going to show you what to do with all of those vintage crocheted tablecloths and other items that you've picked up at estate sales or inherited. You have some of those around the house, don't you - or am I the only one with drawers overflowing with beautiful crocheted items?

Watch the video below or on my Youtube channel to see how to deconstruct these items and suggestions for how they can be used.

Subscribe to my Youtube channel to receive automatic notifications when new videos are posted. You can also click on the Chatterbox Quilts logo in the lower right corner on the video itself to subscribe. If you like what you see, I'd appreciate it if you would share my videos with your fellow creatives.

Creatively,

QuiltFusion Interview with Uncle Gravy

A few weeks ago I discovered a new quilt pattern design app called QuiltFusion. I was so impressed with this app and the fusible web appliqué designs that it allows you to create that I just had to find out more about the origins of QuiltFusion, so I contacted the creator, Uncle Gravy, to find out about the development of this amazing app.

Photo courtesy of www.quiltfusion.com

When you designed QuiltFusion, who was your target audience?

QuiltFusion is for quilters who have ideas and images in their head that they want to create in fabric. Maybe they don’t have the drawing skills to make them on their own - so we give you the artwork, fabrics and tools to compose it. It’s a tool to take your vision and make it in fabric. The fusible web appliqué process is simple and requires no specialized machines or expensive tools.  I think this makes it accessible to a wide variety of skill sets. More advanced quilters might like the quickness of the design process in QuiltFusion, and are able to take the basic pattern and embellish and customize based on their advanced skill set. 

Are you a quilter yourself and if so, what is your favourite technique? (It’s got to be fusible web appliqué, right?).

As an artist, I work in a variety of mediums and love to learn different processes. Quilting and  fabric design are just one of them. Fusible appliqué is awesome because it’s so quick and easy, and produces beautiful results. That being said, I miss the “functional” quality of it, and nothing beats a great pieced quilt to wrap up in. I also went through a big machine embroidery phase (addiction?), and digitized and produced some of my favorite work. 

Do you have to subscribe to QuiltFusion to create a quilt pattern?

Currently, yes, you need a subscription. We are always listening to feedback, and how we can improve the app. One thing we are hearing a lot is being able to download individual patterns, so we are working on a solution for that. (Note: you can create a pattern on QuiltFusion, but you have to have a subscription to download that design).

How can quilters collaborate in designing quilts with QuiltFusion?

Collaboration is huge with me. I’ve gotten a chance to collaborate with a wide variety of artists and the results are always far and away better than I could ever produce on my own. To me, collaboration is the highest form of art. So when I first started formulating an idea for this app, I knew collaboration needed to be a feature. 

You do not need a subscription to collaborate and share. When you design a quilt, you can share it at any time in the gallery by clicking “share”. It then shows up in the gallery under “new”. Anyone can go into the gallery and click “customize” for any quilt. This will load a copy of that design into the editor  and allow you to take that quilt and make it your own. You can change anything you want, from fabric, to borders and adding and removing artwork. You can then share it back to the gallery! 

Photo courtesy of www.quiltfusion.com

The app is young, but I’m really excited to see how quilt designs may evolve over time: we are actually tracking the “ancestry” of designs shared and collaborated on so we can look back and share with the community. Almost like a game of the “telephone” where you whisper a secret around a room and see how it changes with each person. 

If you create a design in QuiltFusion, can you actually make this pattern with the exact fabrics that you used in the app? 

Yes, we want to help you make it in real fabric! So generating a pattern will give you material lists with manufacturer skus, templates and step-by-step instructions on how to make it with fabric. We have gone through a lot of work to make sure even the most novice of quilters can follow the directions to create something beautiful and look exactly how they designed it.

Fabric availability is key – you don’t want to design a quilt that relies on a certain fabric pattern only to learn it’s not available in quilt shops. So we keep the library of fabric up to date. Every week we pull discontinued fabrics and add new fabrics. We also make it easy for you to get the fabrics with our relationship with BatiksPlus.com. There is a simple button in each pattern that will add the required fabrics to a shopping cart on BatiksPlus.com. They have one of the largest inventories of batik fabrics, so getting a custom kit is easy. 

Will you be offering other fabrics in the future or staying with batiks?

The plan was to stay with batiks – but really, it depends on what quilters want. Feedback is important, so if prints or other fabrics are requested, we will do our best to source these and get them into QuiltFusion. 

How often will new designs be added to the QuiltFusion library?

Adding new designs is my favorite part, I love drawing and if I could just do that full-time, I would. We add new designs every week. Some more than others – depends on if we are programming new features, but we generally at 10-20 scene items each week. 

If someone wants to contact you about having their designs included in QuiltFusion, what is the best way to do this?

Shoot an email to unclegravy@quiltfusion.com – We would love to start working with more artists – it’s all one big huge collaboration experiment, and the artist's work is part of it! Because of the pattern generation part of the app, artwork needs to be in a very specific vector format, and sometimes we need to tweak work to make it condusive to the fusible web method. 

Will QuiltFusion always be an iPad app or can we look forward to a desktop version in the future? 

We are planning on a desktop version near the end of the year or early 2016. We have some features in the app version we want to implement first, before porting it over. It will be available on the PC for sure, and “in theory” Mac (sorry, can’t commit to Mac until we get close to that stage of development and do thorough testing). 

Any enhancements that are upcoming in QuiltFusion?

Yes! Hopefully by the time this is published, our new update will be out. It will feature overlapping appliques over the border, and a slew of community oriented features in the gallery (comments, favorites, sharing). We are also working on purchasing individual patterns and designing with pieced backgrounds. (Note: overlapping appliqués over the border are now available in QuiltFusion).

If quilters have questions about QuiltFusion, how can they contact you?

We are pretty accessible everywhere online. Email is the best (unclegravy@quiltfusion.com), followed by posting a comment on any page on our website (good for feature suggestions). Facebook comments are also encouraged. 

Snow globe design on quilt gallery on QuiltFusion. Photo courtesy of www.quiltfusion.com

Anything else you'd like to let potential subscribers know?

Feedback feedback feedback! We love it! and if anyone has a suggestion for content, features, collaboration or questions on making their quilts, just drop us a line. Especially requests for the library. A lot of what goes on my “drawing list” for the week is suggested by quilters. 

Download QuiltFusion from the app store and keep up with the latest updates and news at www.quiltfusion.com.

It's not too early to start designing some Christmas and winter quilts, so check out QuiltFusion today.

Creatively,

Telecast Thursday - Quilt Motif Inspiration

Not sure what motif to quilt on your latest project? It can be difficult to find just the right design. There are lots of books and blogs to provide inspiration to help you make this decision. I find my inspiration elsewhere - in the grocery store.

Watch the video below or on my Youtube channel to find out where I discover my quilt motif inspiration.

Let me know where you find your quilt design inspirations in the comments below.

Creatively,