Voila!

Voila!

I am teaching a two-day class at Sew Portland (part 2 is this Saturday.) We are working on raw-edge fusible applique. I designed an easy baby size quilt to learn on.

Last Saturday we spent time choosing fabrics--each student had her own unique vision. Fabric shopping is so much fun! We could have spent the whole day playing with fabrics but eventually we got to work cutting and stitching the backgrounds and learning to use fusible web. The product we used in class is Steam-a-Seam II Lite. My personal favorite is an oldie but goodie, Wonder Under. I love that stuff. But Steam-a-Seam has the advantage of acting like a Post-It note until you are ready to hit it with the iron, so the applique pieces go on the design wall, get moved around until you love it, then set with the iron, no pinning involved! A huge advantage in a classroom situation or for working on the large-sized petals in this pattern.

With tops done, students headed home to spray-baste the quilts in preparation for this week's completion session. If all goes according to plan, they will secure the fused applique with a variety of stitches, add some quilting in the background (free motion here we come!) and finally, apply the binding entirely by machine.

I couldn't resist showing off Victoria's completed top--she chose prints for her flower petals and added a border to make the quilt a little bigger. Flower Power!

Victoria's top