Jolly the Elf – a Free Christmas Applique Pattern

December 14, 2018

There’s a new free applique pattern for you! Merry Christmas! 🙂

This adorable elf pattern is the same size and style as the other free Christmas applique patterns (10 inch finished blocks). There are five now! (You’ll find links to all of them at the bottom of this post.)

Here’s how to make it. (This video shows all the steps for working with fusible adhesive – if you’ve never done it before you’ll find it helpful.)

Step 1

Download the template pieces here.

Step 2

Trace or print the pattern onto the paper side of the fusible adhesive.

I use printable fusible adhesive so I just printed out the page. No tracing!

The image has already been reversed, so just trace or print. If you’re tracing, be sure to trace the facial features too. You’ll need those for Step 4.

Step 2

Rough cut around each shape and fuse it to the back of your fabric.

Leave a little bit extra all the way around ­- a little extra extra (at least 1/4 inch) where there’s a dotted line, like the top of the shoulders and the base of the ears.

Step 3

Cut around each piece neatly. Cut directly on the solid lines.

Leave a little seam allowance on the dotted lines ­- those are the seam allowances that will tuck behind other pieces.

Step 4

Remember when I told you to make sure you traced the facial features in Step 1? Now you’re going to use that. Hold the face up to a window so the light shines through it. You’ll be able to see the eyes, nose and mouth, and the adhesive will stabilize the fabric so you can trace on it without it crinkling up.

I traced just inside the eyes, and directly on the nose and mouth.

Here you can see all the tracing I did – without the light shining through.

Step 5

If you’re doing Quilt As You Go (I did) then you can quilt your block before adding the applique. So easy!

Cut your background fabric and a piece of 100% cotton batting 11 inches square.

Layer the block with a piece of 100% cotton batting. Quilt any pattern you like!

Find all the Quilt As You Go tutorials here.

If you’ll do the quilting later, simply skip this step.

Step 6

Peel off the paper backing and arrange the pieces on a background block.

Remember -­ all the dotted lines indicate where pieces tuck behind other pieces.

Tuck the ears and the shoulders behind the head. Tuck the head and the top of the hat behind the hat brim.

Fuse the pieces in place.

Step 7

Outline all the pieces with black thread and a simple straight stitch – or choose your favorite decorative stitch.

This video has some tips for outlining those tight curves.

I used 12 wt. thread for all my outlining to get a slightly thicker line. There’s more info about using thicker thread here.

Done!

If you’re making a one-block project, go ahead and finish it up!

If you’re making a bunch of elf blocks to join into a quilt -­ have fun!

What can you do with just one block pattern? Tons of things!

Check out this page I’ve been slowly building – 100 Things to Do with an Applique Pattern. There are links to a bunch of free patterns you can use with your applique pattern to make bibs, pillow covers, tote bags, and more! 🙂

Here are all the free Christmas applique patterns so far.

If you’re looking for a different fun Christmas quilt pattern check out this post. It has a bunch of free patterns for little signs that you can add to a Shiny Happy Houses quilt to turn it into a North Pole quilt. 🙂

Have fun! And share a photo of what you make! You can share it in the Shiny Happy People group or tag it with #shinyhappyworld on Instagram.

If you like this free pattern, sign up for the Shiny Happy News! Subscribers get a weekly newsletter full of sewing tips and tricks, free patterns, special discounts, and other things to make you smile. 🙂

Happy sewing!

Best,
Wendi

Make an Easy Applique Rag Quilt – tutorial

October 25, 2018

Several years ago my mother-in-law made us a fantastic flannel rag quilt. We use it all the time, and every time I look at it I think that it would be super easy to add applique to that style of quilt.

I finally did it!

And it was just as fun and easy as I thought. 🙂

I made mine using the Bunches of Bears quilt pattern, but you could use any quilt pattern you like. All the square quilt blocks in my own patterns are already sized for 10 inch blocks. If you’re using someone else’s pattern you may need to enlarge or reduce the images.

So let’s go!

My quilt is nap sized – 50 x 60 inches – perfect for using on the couch. It’s 5 blocks wide and 6 blocks tall and the blocks all finish at 10 inches.

You can resize the pattern by changing the size of the blocks or by changing the number of blocks. 🙂

I used ten flannel colors (one of each color in the Dash Plaid collection from Dear Stella Fabrics) and bought one yard of each.

I prewashed my flannel. I think people don’t usually do that for rag quilts, but flannel is notorious for shrinking a lot and I didn’t want the shrinking to distort the applique. Don’t use fabric softener in the wash – it can resist the fusible adhesive. Dryer sheets are fine.

Each block is three layers of flannel, so you’ll need to cut 90 blocks, each 11 inches square. You can get nine from one yard of fabric.

Sneaky tip – if you have some ugly flannel that you can’t figure out how it got into your stash, cut 30 of the squares out of that and hide it in the middle of your layers. 🙂

Applique 30 of the squares using any method you like. I used my favorite fusible adhesive method. There’s a video tutorial here. I used Heat & Bond Lite printable fusible adhesive sheets and regular cotton here. You could use flannel for the appliques too if you like, but I wanted to play with the contrasting textures. 🙂

When you position your faces, line up the bottom edge 3/8 inch up from the bottom edge of the block. That way, when you sew the blocks together using 1/2 inch seam allowance, you’ll catch the bottom edge of the applique in the stitching and it will be nice and secure.

Fuse the face into place.

Layer a second square of flannel behind the one with the applique (both facing right side up).

Stitch down all the edges on your applique. Outlining through both layers of flannel adds just a little bit of poof and dimension to your block – not as much as quilting with batting, but similar.

I used the “scribbly” method of going around each bit three times with regular weight black thread and a simple straight stitch. There’s a post here with more detail about that, and one here with more info about using a heavier weight thread if you prefer that.

This post has tips for stitching the tight curves around the eyes, and also for stitching the mouths. And this one has tips for making dark eyes show up on dark faces, like this cutie.

After you get all 30 blocks appliqued, it’s time to sew them together. This was actually the hardest part, because it’s backwards from any other kind of sewing you’ll do normally.

Add a third layer of flannel to each block, this time with the right side facing the back of the quilt. (It’s going to become your quilt back.)

Using 1/2″ seam allowance, sew two blocks wrong sides together so that the seam allowance is on the right side of the quilt.

Here’s what it looks like from the back.

See? That last layer of flannel makes a nice quilt back, and you have a nice clean seam.

I joined all of my blocks into rows of five, then sewed those rows together for the finished quilt.

The intersections can get very bulky, so I snipped into the seam allowance 1/2″ from each edge and sewed my crossing seam through that slit so I wasn’t stitching the seam allowance down.

And look – my seam secures the bottom edge of each bear, just like I planned. 🙂

I found it helpful to use my quarter inch foot, but adjust it out to 1/2 inch for sewing all those layers together.

I also lengthened my stitch to 3.0 and reduced the pressure on my presser foot to keep the layers from creeping. If you can’t make that adjustment on your machine, just use a lot of pins or clips, as if you were sewing napped fabrics together.

Once all the blocks are sewn together, sew all the way around the outside edge of the quilt, one half inch in from the raw edge.

Now it’s time to snip all those seams.

Snip 1/2 inch apart all along all the seam allowances, almost up to the stitching line. Be very careful not to cut into your stitching. If you slip and snip it, repair it now by sewing over the snipped seam.

If you’re trying to snip with regular scissors, you’ll need to take a LOT of breaks. They’re really not designed for this kind of work.

If you can afford to buy a special set of snips just for this kind of work, it is absolutely worth it. I tried several brands and the Fiskars Easy Action Tabletop Rag Quilt Snips were by far my favorite. They have a spring action, so their default setting is open, which saves a surprising amount of strain on your wrist. They’re super sharp, and the blades are slightly serrated, so they really grip the fabric well, helping them cut right up to the tips of the blades without “pushing” the fabric out at all.

Even with the fancy snips I took a break between snipping the horizontal and vertical seams. It took about two hours total.

Don’t forget to snip around the outside edges too.

When you’re done snipping, throw it in the wash and tumble dry.

Ta daa!

All those snipped edges fray in the wash and you get a really soft, fluffy ridge between each block. This blanket is just begging for someone to snuggle under it.

If you make an applique flannel rag quilt, we’d love to see it! Post a photo in the Shiny Happy People group so we can all oooh and aaah. 🙂

Find links to all the posts about pattern size and layouts here.

Quilt Sizes and Supplies Needed

Play with Your Layouts – Multiple Possibilities for One Quilt Pattern

Sashing

How to Make Applique Bust Out of Its Frame

Alternate or Broken Grid layouts (adding half and double blocks)

How to Make an Applique Rag Quilt

How to Make a Polaroid Quilt

How to Make a Wonky Churn Dash Frame for Any Block

Finished with this topic?

Return to the Let’s Make a Quilt main Table of Contents.

Move on to the lessons about choosing your fabric.

Happy stitching!

Monster Pattern Sale – 20% Off

October 2, 2018

October is Monster Month (of course) so we’re having a Monster Craft-Along and a Monster Pattern Sale!

Stacey and I both LOVE monsters, so you’ve got a lot of patterns to choose from. 🙂 Those images up there are just a tiny sample.

Shop all the patterns here.

Use the discount code SILLY for 20% off.

Sale ends Monday 10/7 at midnight eastern time.

Stacey and I both have really terrific monster classes on Craftsy. The Shiny Happy World sale code doesn’t work on them, but Craftsy has sales all the time and if you use these links you’ll get the current sale price.

Amigurumi: Design Your Own Monster Craftsy Class

Stacey’s Design Your Own Monster class is fantastic – my favorite of all her classes. Get that class here.

Cute Quilt-As-You-Go Applique Monsters - a new Craftsy class with Wendi Gratz of Shiny Happy World

My Cute Quilt-As-You-Go Applique Monsters class includes my Mix & Match Monsters pattern. It’s so much fun to make! Get that class here.

Happy stitching!

Best,
Wendi

Peekaboo Mouse Pattern

September 17, 2018

A lot of people have pulled the little mouse from the Noisy Farm quilt pattern to use in other quilts – but not everyone wants to buy a pattern with twelve different farm animals just for the little mouse!

I’ve been getting a lot of requests lately for the mouse as his own little pattern.

He’s finally here!

You can use it on its own – that mouse would be adorable peeking out of a pocket. Or you can use it combined with other quilt patterns, as shown in the image above.

Important note – the pattern only includes the mouse – not the cat. The cat is just there to show the two ways you can use the mouse pattern in your quilt blocks.

I didn’t just write up the pattern – I also recorded some new video tutorials especially for this little guy!

This is the first pattern I’ve ever done where I also include a link to download an SVG file of the pattern pieces – for those who have cutting machines like Cricut and Silhouette.

This video shows what to do with that file (for a Cricut Maker) once you’ve downloaded it. Heads up – it’s a long one.

If you don’t use a cutting machine, that’s fine. The pattern includes the regular pattern pieces for printing or tracing and cutting by hand.

Once you’ve got all your pieces cut, here’s how to assemble the little guy. I show how to put him on the edge of the block, and also how to make him peek out from behind another applique critter.

Finally – there’s the outlining. I know a lot of people will see that face and think NO WAY. I don’t like hand-stitching and that’s too small to do on the machine.

Not so!

Of course you can stitch the face by hand, but you can do every bit of it on the machine – no fancy embroidery features needed. Here’s how I do it on mine, just using regular straight stitch.

That’s it!

Get the pattern here and start adding adorable little mice to all your projects. 🙂

Happy stitching!

New Colors for the Noisy Farm

September 10, 2018

I get a lot of emails from people asking for advice choosing quilt colors. I always point them to the Shiny Happy People group where they can see many, many different quilts made with my patterns – usually using different colors than what I used in my samples. Really – seeing a finished quilt is the very best way to imagine it in different colors!

So I’ll be making more of an effort to show my quilt patterns in new color combinations – just to show as many options as possible. 🙂

I recently remade the Noisy Farm quilt, using it as an example to how you can add sashing to any of my quilt patterns. While I was at it – I changed the colors too!

Here’s the original quilt in a crib size.

Noisy Farm made in the original quilt colors

And here’s the new version.

Noisy Farm pattern with added sashing and new quilt colors

In addition to adding the sashing – I used radically different colors!

I made the original sample before I had fabric bundles in my shop, so it’s not easy to say exactly what fabric packs they’d use now, but the Warm Neutrals would be the best choice for those natural-colored animals. The backgrounds are mostly greens and blues, so the closest match would be the Green Batiks and Blue Batiks.

The new version uses the Rainbow Sherbet bundle for the background blocks – pretty pale pastel solids. They really do look like soft sherbet colors. 🙂 

For the animals I went totally UNnatural with all kinds of fun colors and a wobbly, hand-painted gingham print. Here’s a close-up view of a silly pink sheep with a little turquoise mouse popping into the frame.

I love it!

That fabulous gingham print is called Gingham Play from Michael Miller fabrics. I sell bundles of my favorite Gingham Play colors here.

For the sashing I used Hash Dot in linen, also Michael Miller Fabrics. I liked how it has a slightly barn-ish feel while still balancing nicely with the soft pastel background fabrics. Sorry – I don’t sell that one in my shop, but you can search for Linen Hash Dot and lots of online sellers will pop up.

So there you go! New colors and a new layout for a totally new look for a favorite quilt pattern.

Want to know how to add that sashing? Here are the posts you’ll need for that.

Happy stitching!

Best,
Wendi

Adding Sashing to (Almost) Any Shiny Happy World Quilt Pattern

August 31, 2018
Pastel quilt with applique farm animals, demonstrating adding sashing to a quilt pattern.

For years I’ve had people ask me about adding sashing to a quilt pattern from Shiny Happy World.

That’s an easy question.

Yes!

You can always modify any pattern to add (or take away) sashing.

Sometimes they have another question. How does adding sashing to a quilt change the yardage they need to buy?

Well – that’s a whole other question that requires a much longer answer. 🙂 So long that the best way to give it to you is as a printable download. It has fabric requirements, cutting guides, and assembly diagrams for six different quilt sizes with sashing and borders. Download it here.

First – let me clarify. I say almost any quilt pattern because these measurements will only work for square blocks. If you’re adding sashing to a quilt with double blocks or half blocks, you’ll need to do a little extra math for that. But the measurements in that PDF work for any of my quilt patterns that have 10 inch square blocks – and that’s almost all of them. 🙂

Remember, there’s a general post showing how to add sashing to any quilt here, and one with details about how to prepare and sew sashing or borders with Quilt As You Go quilts here.

These tutorials will also be helpful. . .

And one more reminder – all of these measurements only work if you have an accurate 1/4 inch seam. If you don’t have a quarter inch foot on your machine, I strongly recommend getting one. It will make your life sooooooo much easier. 🙂

Find links to all the posts about pattern size and layouts here.

Quilt Sizes and Supplies Needed

Play with Your Layouts – Multiple Possibilities for One Quilt Pattern

Sashing

How to Make Applique Bust Out of Its Frame

Alternate or Broken Grid layouts (adding half and double blocks)

How to Make an Applique Rag Quilt

How to Make a Polaroid Quilt

How to Make a Wonky Churn Dash Frame for Any Block

Finished with this topic?

Return to the Let’s Make a Quilt main Table of Contents.

Move on to the lessons about choosing your fabric.

Happy quilting!

Divide and Conquer – How to Pin Long Seams

August 30, 2018

I’m moving right along on my version of the Noisy Farm quilt with sashing added, and I realized this is the perfect time to share a little tip with you about pinning long seams.

I’m not very bossy about pinning most of the time. Some people pin, some don’t, and I’m mostly a live and let live kind of person. 🙂

But when it comes to long seams (like the ones attaching those looong sashing strips to rows) you’ll find that pinning – and actually pinning in a very particular way – will save you a lot of headaches.

Here’s the problem. If you just slap a long strip on your strip of blocks and just start sewing without pinning – there’s a really good chance that when you get to the end of the long seam, one of those pieces is going to be significantly longer than the other. This happens even if you use a walking foot and even if you’re really careful about keeping your tension even. It just happens.

You know what keeps it from happening?

Pins. 🙂

I’ve got a specific method I use to pin longs seams. I call it Divide and Conquer.

Here’s a seam I just pinned. (Actually clipped. When I pin already-quilted layers together I prefer to use sewing clips. They distort the fabric less.)

I loaded up a really large image size here so you can click on it to see it even bigger on your screen.

Those numbers show you the order in which I placed those clips.

First I start by clipping the ends – 1 and 2. That way I know that my ends are going to be perfectly lined up.

Next I want to divide that space in half (Divide and Conquer) and I place the clip right in the middle. That’s #3.

That leaves me with two large spaces – the one between 1 and 3 and the one between 3 and 2. I divide those spaces in half by adding clips 4 and 5.

Finally, I divide all the remaining spaces in half by placing clips 6, 7, 8 and 9.

It’s always the same – I start by securing the ends, then just keep dividing the remaining spaces in half over and over again until my clips are close enough together to take it to the machine.

Divide and conquer. 🙂

I hope this is helpful!

The post with all the information about adding sashing will be up tomorrow!

Best,
Wendi

A New Version of the Noisy Farm Quilt!

August 10, 2018
Noisy Farm Quilt pattern from Shiny Happy World

I’ve gotten a lot of questions lately asking for suggestions for the background colors of the Noisy Farm quilt pattern.

The cover sample you see above is from before I had fabric bundles in my shop, and most of the fabrics I used are no longer available.

One of the things I love about the way I do fabric bundles now is that you can use any bundle for any quilt. Here’s an example of three quilts that all use the Warm Neutrals fat quarter bundle for the animals – but different bundles for the background colors.

Here are the Playful Puppies made with Solid Rainbow for the background blocks.

And here are the Cuddly Cats with the slightly-more-grownup-but-still-colorful Box of Crayons for the background blocks.

And here is the Bunches of Bears pattern made with the Rainbow Sherbet bundle for the background blocks.

See what a difference?

Changing just the background colors really changes the whole feel of the quilt – and I love them all!

So when people ask for suggestions for background colors for the Noisy Farm pattern – I want to tell them they can use anything! Go totally bright with the Solid Rainbow! Go a little more subdued with Box of Crayons! Go baby sweet with Rainbow Sherbet! Go natural with Green Batiks! Want even more suggestions? Go to the Noisy Farm pattern listing and look at the additional photos. There are a bunch showing finished quilts that other people have made with different fabrics than my samples.

For my new version of the Noisy Farm quilt I used Rainbow Sherbet for the background blocks. I went totally wild with the animals and using the Gingham Play fat quarter bundle. Gingham always says “farm” to me and I can’t wait to make the animals in fantasy colors.

Pastel version of the Noisy Farm quilt pattern

One more change – I made this one a silent farm. 🙂 I left off the half-blocks with animal sounds and added sashing. I get a lot of requests about adding sashing to a Quilt As You Go quilt. There’s a tutorial here showing how you can reset (almost) any of my quilt patterns with added sashing. I even did the math for you for all the sizes. 🙂

If you’ve made any of my quilt patterns using a different color scheme – please share! Seeing all the different versions of my patterns makes me Muppet-arms-flailing happy – and it’s a great resource for your fellow makers out there to see different options. 🙂

Happy stitching!

Best,
Wendi

How to Quilt a Quilt with a Broken Grid Layout – video tutorial

July 31, 2018

Some of my quilts have what I call a “broken grid” layout. You’ll also see it called an “alternate grid.”

Both of these terms refer to quilt layouts that aren’t the standard checkerboard-style grid, with all the seams running in straight, uninterrupted lines from edge to edge.

I’ve got a video here that shows how to assemble those quilts – how to group the blocks into chunks that eventually do connect with straight, edge to edge seams.

But I get a lot of questions about how, exactly, I quilt these quilts. Do I quilt around each square individually? Do I turn the corner to go around a block that’s interrupting my straight line?

Nope and nope. 🙂

At this point in the process I have my entire quilt sewn together and I want to do everything possible to avoid turning any corners while I’m quilting, because that means turning the entire mass of the quilt, and that is not fun.

So what do I do?

I hop over the block that’s blocking my way.

This video shows what I mean by that.

See?

Just hop right over those pesky blocks. 🙂

Do be sure to backstitch or knot – whatever technique you use to secure your threads – any time you have to stop or start quilting.

Get the Fish quilt pattern here.

Get the Sea Creatures quilt pattern here.

Find links to all the posts about pattern size and layouts here.

Quilt Sizes and Supplies Needed

Play with Your Layouts – Multiple Possibilities for One Quilt Pattern

Sashing

How to Make Applique Bust Out of Its Frame

Alternate or Broken Grid layouts (adding half and double blocks)

How to Make an Applique Rag Quilt

How to Make a Polaroid Quilt

How to Make a Wonky Churn Dash Frame for Any Block

Finished with this topic?

Return to the Let’s Make a Quilt main Table of Contents.

Move on to the lessons about choosing your fabric.

Happy quilting!

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to a Quilt Block

June 19, 2018
How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

That house doesn’t look very special – right?

Look closer!

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Peekaboo!

The door opens!

Here’s how to do it.

I’m using an example of one block from the Shiny Happy Houses quilt pattern, but you could adapt this idea in all kind of ways! I list a few possibilities at the end of the tutorial.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Step 1

Trace or print all your pattern pieces as usual. You’re going to do three things with your door piece.

  1. Print or trace your door onto the fusible adhesive – just like normal.
  2. Also trace your door onto a piece of freezer paper.
  3. Also trace your door onto the fusible adhesive house piece – right where you want it to go.

Step 2

We’ll start with making the door itself.

Cut the door piece out of the freezer paper a little bit bigger all the way around. Do this neatly – it’s just to make the door a smidge bigger than the door opening. Mine is a little bit more than an extra 1/8″ all the way around.

Layer two pieces of door fabric right sides together and fuse the freezer paper door piece to the wrong side of the top layer.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Use the edge of the freezer paper as a guide and stitch almost all the way around the door, leaving a little bit open for turning on the side where the “hinges” would be. Don’t forget to backstitch at the beginning and end of your stitching.

Step 3

Trim around the door, leaving a small seam allowance.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Clip away the excess completely at the corners.

Step 4

Turn the door right side out through the opening. Smooth your curves, poke out your corners, and tuck the seam allowance at the opening inside and press the whole thing nice and flat.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

I’ve got my turning stick going into the opening here so you can see where it is. 🙂

Now set the door aside for a bit.

Step 5

Fuse the house piece and the “behind the door” piece to the back of their fabrics.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Cut out the house piece right on the line – including cutting away the door that you traced.

Cut the “behind the door” piece right on the line at the bottom of the door. Leave a little extra fabric at the top and sides.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Here they are from the front after cutting them out. It’s fun to fussy cut something cute for the “behind the door” piece. 🙂

Step 6

Peel off the paper backings, layer all the pieces together, and fuse.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

The “behind the door” piece should be tucked behind the door opening so that it peeks out.

Step 7

Outline all the pieces as usual.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

You’ll only need to stitch around the door opening on the house piece – that stitching also secures the unicorn piece behind it.

Step 8

Sew the door in place by stitching down the side with the turning opening.

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

No hand sewing needed!

Finished!

How to Add a Door (that opens!) to your quilt block - a tutorial from Shiny Happy World

Add a button doorknob if you like. 🙂

You can play with this idea in so many ways! Add shutters to the windows! Make a camouflaged “door” in a treetop (using the same fabric as the rest of the treetop) and hide a little bird or squirrel in there! I know someone out there has used the Shiny Happy Houses pattern to make a castle. Add a functioning drawbridge!

The possibilities are endless, and I can’t wait to see what you all make!

Here are links to all the posts showing how to applique with fusible adhesive – my favorite method. It’s fast and easy and (with the right materials) it holds up beautifully to rough use and repeated washing.

Here are links to special posts about eyes.

Here are links to some extra fun things you can do with your applique.

Other Applique Methods

Finished with this topic?

Return to the Let’s Make a Quilt main Table of Contents.

Move on to the lessons about outline stitching.

Happy stitching!