Black And White Scottie Dog

I came to know about this scottie dog when Madhu of Desi Quilter's group posted a snap of the dog she made for her friend. That was so lovely and My daughter would love it. So as my daughter is at her aunt's place, I wanted to make this as a surprise gift for her. I know that she would shower me with her kisses when she sees this beautiful dog. This also serves another purpose for me. For this month's Desi Quilter's Challenge, we need to make a quilt with black, white and a printed fabric. So I think I hit two birds with a stone. This is also my entry to the challenge. I searched the web for a tutorial and came across a free download for the pattern at dsquilts. I followed the tutorial and ended up with this lovely looking dog. The toughest part was the joining of the side strip. I struggled to get it neat and it was worth the effort. I recently bought a 1/4" pressure foot and it was of great help when joining squares. The squares came out neat and aligned beautifully.

The dog uses squares black and white along with a long black stripe.

Black- 2 1/4" square -26 nos

White- 2 1/4" squares-26 nos

Black stripe 55" long and 2 1/4" wide

Printed cotton stripe 26" long and 6" wide for the collar

Cut all the squares and the black stripe.

Arrange the squares as shown. You need to make another piece which is the mirror image of the given pattern.

First join the near by squares in the same row. Press the seams flat.

Now join the rows. Press the seams flat.

Make the other side which is the mirror image of the first side.

Join the stripe along the sides and finally join both the sides of the stripe.

Now join the stripe with the other side leaving 5" for turning over.

Bring inside out through the opening.

Stuff it neatly with synthetic cotton.

Finish off the opening with a hand stitched zig zag stitch.

Knot it up.

Join the stripe along the side keeping the fabric right to right.

Turn inside out and press at the seam.

Stitch off both the ends.

Tie it around the dog's neck and secure it with a stitch. Stitch two buttons for eyes and a flower at the knot.

Patch Work Ball 2

This patch work ball is the second one of the two patch work balls in the QAL(quilt along) organised in the group. Amalie who taught us this Pentagon patch work ball taught this triangle patch work ball and she  asked us to hand stitch the pieces rather than machine stitching them. It uses paper piecing .I used this technique in the previous pentagon ball. You need a little patience to make this and it will be done in a day. I used two printed contrast fabrics. You are free to use any number of fabrics. 

You need 10 pieces of triangles in each fabric and it makes a total of 20 triangles. First cut out 20 triangles measuring 2 1/2" on the three sides. Make use of your high school geometry lessons to draw out the triangles. After cutting out 20 pieces in the chart paper, cut out triangles from the fabrics. The fabric pieces must be larger than the paper pieces by 1/4" on all sides. If you are not comfortable with 1/4" then make it slightly larger. 

Cut out the chart paper and fabric triangles.

Place a paper triangle inside the fabric triangle. Fold it as shown.

Now fold both the sides towards the centre and press it with your fingers.

Secure the fabric with thread. Knot it when all the three corners are done.

Now you get a neatly finished triangle.

Finish the other 19 triangles the same way. Arrange the triangles as shown. This is the way you are going to stitch up the sides.

Join adjacent sides using whip stitch. While joining be careful not to stitch the paper pieces. The needle should run only through the fabrics.

The stitched triangles look like this. Keep the stitches tight so that very little of the thread shows.

Stitch as arranged. Now you need to stitch the sides of triangles next to each other. 

When you stitch together the adjacent sides, the ball will be formed.

This is after stitching up the lower triangles.

Now join all the remaining sides except two sides. That is for flipping and filling.

Remove the paper pieces.

It looks lot better with out the paper pieces.

Turn it inside out.

Stuff the ball with the cotton or synthetic stuffing.

Thread a needle and insert it at the joint. Take a stitch to one side.

Take a stitch on the other side. Keep on repeating the stitches in the zig zag fashion.

Align the corners correctly for a perfect finish.

Finish it with a tiny knot. The patch work ball is ready..

You can view the works of all the other members of the group at the Desi Quilters Blog

Strip Quilted Mat

There are challenges for every month in Desi Quilters. The rules will be given at the start of the month and we need to make a quilt according to the given rules. For the month of October the challenge was to make a strip quilt. Any quilt involving strips qualify for the submission. I saw the method of paper piecing a strip quilt blog at FITF blog. I used that method for the 8 blocks which form the centre of the mat. Both sides of the centre piece are strips of different colours matching the centre piece. The quilt is completed with batting, backing and binding. This is the first time I am using batting and I was nervous. Though the finished mat looks good, it needs some fine tuning. May be I will get the finishing works perfect in my next quilt.

The quilt measures 34" * 36" and I will be using it for meditation after yoga. The fabrics used are printed cotton. The backing used is also printed cotton and the batting is also cotton. I finished the quilt with a 3" wide binding.

Cut out strips of fabric. I used four printed and one solid white. For the blue strips, I used 1 1/2" strips and the yellow and orange strips measured 2". The white strip measured 1 1/2". Cut out 8 paper squares measuring 8" * 8 ".

In the centre of the paper, stick the white strip diagonally using gum stick.

Stitch the darker blue strip placing it right to right on the white strip.

Open the seam and iron it out.

Now place the lighter blue strip right side facing the darker strip and stitch.

Open the seam and iron.

Continue until you reach the corner of the paper.

Stitch the orange and yellow strips to the other side of the white strip.

Now turn the block and trim the fabric to the size of the paper square.

Your block looks like this.

Now remove the paper from the block. It will be easy to remove as the paper is perforated with the stitch.

Press the block and it is ready to be stitched.

To get an idea of the finished quilt, arrange the pieces on the floor. Now stitch all the pieces together.

Cut out batting and backing fabric to the size of the finished piece.

Pin all the sides and centre before stitching.

Stitch the sides and along the lines of the blocks.

Finish the quilt with the binding.

The backing fabric seen after folding over the quilt.