Easy Placemat Tutorials {Inspiration}

I am in full Thanksgiving prep mode -- and also working every day other than Thanksgiving this week -- so today I am doing a round up post of some of my favorite tutorials about placemats that are free! These are all quick and easy projects that you could potentially squeeze in before your Thanksgiving dinner if you're feeling ambitious.

Jet Setter Placemats: These placemats were made with yardage and precuts, but the small squares could easily be cut from scraps!

Bunny Patch Placemats: These are my favorite to use at home! These were made from 10" squares but could easily be made from your favorite yardage.

Chit Chat Placemats: These only use 3.5" squares and yardage, so this is another great project for scraps!

Finally, last year I made some placemat sets to donate to a fundraiser. The first set used the Bunny Patch Tutorial with Valentine's candy fabrics.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving and I'll be back next week! I am looking forward to starting the Frolic mystery quilt on Friday!

Faceted Churn Dash {Finished Wall Hanging}

If you are in our Honey, Bunny, and Doll FB group, you've seen all of the progress on this wall hanging!

I hosted a "casual QAL" for our Faceted pattern collection on FB this fall -- it was a lot of fun to do something from an already written pattern rather than a brand new pattern and it's something I will do again!

Returning back to the beginning, I cut the majority of the scraps used in this project using my Accuquilt cutter. 

A lot of half-square triangles later, I incrementally made the pieces and parts for this quilt top.

Parts became the block, and I added the pieced border.

For the quilting, I used a flowerly paisley motif. This is different from my other Faceted wall hangings, where I did different quilting motifs in the piecing, background, and borders.

For the backing, I found a few large pieces of some of my scrap fabrics and sewed them together. I used four different WOF strips of different sizes, which was perfect because the quilt is 36" square.

For the binding, I had just enough of the grey/teal/yellow medallion print. For the hanging sleeve I also used the zig zag print.

Now to find a place to hang this beauty!

Quilt Stats:
Name: Faceted Churn Dash
Pattern: Faceted Churn Dash
Fabrics: scraps, scraps, and more scraps
Techniques: free motion quilting, Accuquilt cutting, endless HSTs
Quilting: Free motion flower paisley
Size: 36" square
Batting: scrap batting
Started: September 2019
Finished: November 2019
Future: Wall hanging for my bedroom

Sharing at Finished or Not Friday, TGIFF at Sarah Goer Quilts, and Peacock Party and Brag about your Beauties!

Mosaic Mystery Quilt {Diagonal Blocks}

I had some bonus sewing time last night and I decided to knock out the November clue for the Mosaic Mystery Quilt.

This month, our assignment was to make "diagonal blocks" and my units use my scrappy pink fabrics. I made four units in each of the four colors.

Here are my four sets of units thus far.

I still have a lot of cut pieces and parts that haven't been touched yet, so I would guess that we will have at least two more months' worth of piecing before the quilt top will be revealed. This is just a guess, but I am liking how my units are coming together thus far.

Sharing at the November Mosaic Mystery link-up!

Make sure to enter to win some beautiful fabrics from Island Batik in my giveaway!

Christmas is Coming {Jingle Blocks}

Since I have my Island Batik Ambassador project done for the month (but make sure to enter the giveaway!) I decided that I should try to make a push on some of my WIPs before the end of the year.

I also need to work on my scrap and stash organization, so I pulled out the bag of leftover fabrics from my April Showers quilt, and pulled out all of the green and red fabrics to use in some Jingle Bell Square blocks. 

This project has kind of been a boom and bust project -- I work on it until I run out of background fabric scraps and then put it away until I find or buy something else to add into the quilt for background. This time around, I was able to easily make six blocks from my April Showers scraps.

I was able to make four red blocks and two green blocks; these blocks are mostly the April Showers fabrics with a few others mixed in.

I even mixed in a few of my long-horded Amanda Murphy Christmas fabrics! I am working on a secret sewing project with these fabrics (coming soon!) so I have set aside the scraps to add into my Jingle Bell Square blocks. 

But again, I have reached the end of the line with my background scraps! I did, however, manage to sew together quite a few sets of side strip pieced units and corner QSTs for the next batch of blocks.

I now have 17 more blocks to go -- I'll need to make seven more red blocks and ten more green blocks.

Happy Wednesday -- what are you sewing this week?

Make sure to enter to win some beautiful fabrics from Island Batik in my giveaway!

Hip To Be Square -- Times Two {A Piece Of Blog Hop}

Today is my day on the A Piece Of blog hop with Island Batik, showing off their new fabric lines, shipping to stores now!

The line of fabric I was assigned was "Little Sir, Little Miss"! This fabric line has a whopping 40 different prints!

Instead of trying to squeeze all 40 prints into a single quilt, I decided to split the prints up into two quilts! I used our fast-and-fun pattern Hip To Be Square for these quilts!

For the first quilt, I used the black and tan numbers print for the background with the neutral and warm colored prints. I used a peach Aurifil thread to free motion quilt meanders all over this quilt. For the binding, I used two tan prints from the line.

For the second quilt, I used a cream triangle print for the background with the cool colored prints. I used a purple Aurifil thread to free motion quilt meanders for this quilt. I used two different purple prints for the binding for this quilt.

The big piecing of this pattern shows off the beautiful prints in this line!

And now, to go with my two quilts, TWO GIVEAWAYS!

I have trimmed up the remainders of my Little Sir, Little Miss collection into two sets:

First, 14 quarter yard cuts of the "cool" side of the collection:

Second: the rest of the fabrics trimmed up into 5" strips and 10" squares:

To enter, please leave me comments below, up to three entries per person. Giveaway will close on 11/22/19.
1. Easy entry for everyone! Leave any comment.
2. Bonus entry for my followers -- leave me a comment telling you how you follow my blog.
3. Bonus entry for everyone -- Visit the Island Batik website and tell me which of the new collections is your favorite. Click here to visit!

Update: These giveaways are now closed and the winners are...

My fellow Ambassador Suzy also made a quilt with this line -- she was much more creative than I and managed to fit all 40 fabrics into one quilt!

These fabrics were graciously given to me by Island Batik -- I am so happy to share them with you! The batting was provided by Hobbs and the thread was provided by Aurifil --- thank you!

Get your own copy of our Hip To Be Square pattern:
Etsy -- digital download
Payhip -- digital download

Quilt Stats:
Name: Warm/Cool Hip To Be Square
Pattern: Hip To Be Square (link above)
Fabrics: Little Sir, Little Miss from Island Batik
Techniques: free motion quilting, machine binding
Quilting: Free motion meanders
Size: 60" x 78"
Batting: Hobbs 80/20 batting 
Started: August 2019
Finished: November 2019
Future: These have been sold to a family friend for her grandkids!

Sharing at Finished or Not Friday and Peacock Party!

Stash Sorting {Frolic Mystery Quilt}

This weekend, after putting the binding on my blog hop quilts for tomorrow, I started pulling fabrics for the upcoming mystery quilt hosted by Bonnie Hunter -- FROLIC!

This year's colors for the mystery quilt are inspired by fields of flowers and I have modified my color scheme slightly to better fit my scraps.

Here's the suggested colors and my replacements:

Dark blue --- Navy tone on tone scraps

Medium blue --- Dark teal scraps

Raspberry --- Coral yardage

Light aqua --- Light aqua scraps

Neutrals --- White on white print yardage (not pictured)

Green --- Golden yellow scraps

For the first two mystery quilts that I did, Good Fortune and On Ringo Lake, I made half as many units for each step and made throw sized quilts, smaller than the original pattern. I should have enough fabrics this time around to make the entire as-written quilt pattern, but I might start off making 3/4 of the units just to make sure I have enough of the dark blue fabrics.

But those are all decisions for another day! Tomorrow is my day on the Fall Island Batik blog hop! Come back to see *TWO* great quilts and *TWO* super giveaways!

Sharing at Wednesday Wait Loss!

A Piece Of... Blog Hop Schedule {Fall Island Batik Hop!}

Today is the start of the fall Island Batik blog hop, featuring new fabric collections that are shipping to your local quilt shops now! Below is the full blog hop schedule and links to the bloggers participating, as well as photos of each collection!

Find your local Island Batik carrying quilt shop with this handy store locator! There will be wonderful giveaways hosted by each participating blogger, as well as on the Island Batik site, so make sure to check back each day of the hop!

My blog hop day is this week on Thursday! I have a *big* fabric giveaway planned! Click here to go to the Island Batik Rafflecopter giveaway!

Monday, November 4:

Janet Yamamoto at Whispers of Yore

Emily Leachman at The Darling Dogwood

Tuesday, November 5:

Dione Gardner-Stephen at Clever Chameleon
Sherri Shish at Powered By Quilting

Laura Piland at Slice of Pi Quilts

Wednesday, November 6:

Anja Clyke at Anja Quilts

Thursday, November 7:

Suzy Webster @ Webster Quilt

Alison Vermilya @ Little Bunny Quilts (that's me!)

Friday, November 8

Blog Round-Up Week 1

Monday, November 11:

Jennifer Fulton

Barbara Gaddy

Tuesday, November 12:

Sarah Goer

Stephanie Jacobson

Wednesday, November 13:

Anita Skjellanger

Kim Lapacek

Thursday, November 14:

Becca Fenstermaker

Carolina Asmussen

Friday, November 15

Blog Hop Round Up Week 2

Monday, November 18:

Denise Looney

Geraldine Wilkins

Tuesday, November 19:

Jackie O’Brien

Sally Manke

Wednesday, November 20:

Jennifer Thomas

Leah Malasky

Friday, November 22:

Blog Hop roundup Week 3

Brutal Honesty {November 2019}

It is November and October went by in a flash! I have been busy working on my blog hop project for next week, but hopefully more progress will happen soon!

Completed tops:
1. Breezy Blooms C2C Bee -- July UFO project -- no progress
2. Radiant Jewel Quilt -- April UFO project -- I basted this quilt and have ordered thread!
3. Daisy Chain Quilt -- no progress
4. Rail Fence Baby Quilt -- This was made from scraps!

Tops partially finished:
5. Romantic Garden Quilt -- no progress
6. Monthly Wall Hangings -- March UFO project -- no progress
7. Pineapple Stash Bee Blocks -- February UFO project -- no progress
8. Not Quite Christmas Ribbons -- I have added a neutral border and am trying to decide on a final border for this quilt.

Just blocks and units:
9. Sew Kitschy Blocks -- no progress
10. Cubicle Quilts -- I am working on putting together some additional backgrounds and working on applique on a few of the already completed backgrounds.
11. Happy Houses blocks -- September UFO project -- no progress
12. Birthstone blocks -- June UFO project -- no progress
13. Jingle Bell Square -- no progress
14. Big Block C2C Bee Quilt -- no progress
15. Marigold Quilt -- no progress
16. Pave the Way Quilt -- no progress
17. Faceted Churn Dash -- Our "sort of QAL" on Facebook is nearing its end!

Quilt alongs and long term projects:
18. Monthly Island Batik Ambassador projects -- In October, our theme was table toppers and I made a Halloween Table Runner. For November, I am going to be sharing a blog hop project featuring some great new fabrics!

19. Mosaic Mystery Quilt -- I have completed both the September and October sewing directions and am waiting on the November directions to be released next week!

My UFO for October was to work on making use of some of my orphaned blocks and projects. This was actually a success. I quilted a forgotten-about baby quilt top and disassembled some orphaned blocks to use the fabric in other projects. I also used scraps to make the rail fence baby quilt top.

My UFO for November will be my Sew Kitschy blocks.