I have often seen a block pattern I'd like to try out, but once I've made a few blocks I'd rather do something else, and the "orphan" blocks end up in a drawer waiting for a purpose. As I am a member of "The Quilt Show" online with Alex and Ricky, I have access to frequent challenges and contests, and recently there was a table runner contest, with a spring theme. I thought immediately that some brightly colored paper pieced blocks I had in a drawer would make delicious spring flowers, and this tutorial takes you through the process.
First, let me introduce you to the blocks. I had several 9 inches square, and one 7 inches.
The first thing to do was to turn a square into a
circle. I used a compass to measure how big the circle had to be and,
keeping it open in the same position, drew a matching circle on
cardboard to cut out and use as a template. I then stitched a basting
stitch around the outer edge of the circle, about 1/8 inch in, and,
centering the cardboard template on the wrong side of the block I drew
the ends of the thread tight, turning the edges under neatly and without
any pain. Once the edges were all turned, I sprayed sizing all around
the edge a pressed it with a fairly hot iron.
Using 2 of the 9 inch blocks, my plan was to have many different green fabric 'petals' around the edges of each, at both ends of the table runner. So the next step was to make the petals. I cut a petal shape out of some heat resistant template plastic, and then cut out a bunch of green petals, all about 1/4 inch larger than the template. The size of the petal template depends entirely on the look that you want, but here is the template shape I used which you could enlarge or reduce to suit your own project (right click the image and save to your own computer). I used the template material instead of cardboard because I was making multiple copies, and cardboard, if you're going to spray liquid sizing on it, will only be good for 1 use.
On background fabric, cut a little bit larger than what you want your finished table runner to be, I lightly drew a circle with the original cardboard template and used that to space my petals, starting with north, south, east and west spots and then filling in the rest. I used 16 petals per block, randomly placed as far as fabrics, with an eye for the values so that I didn't end up with a bunch of darks all in the same place, or vice versa. Once placed, I glued them to the background, one up, one under, alternating all around, and then glued the circle block on top of that. I use glue stick or the liquid elmers. Glue stick is stickier, like a sticky note, whereas elmers glue needs to dry, or be set with an iron. I hand appliqued the petals down before I attached the star block, simply because I like the look best, but it could all easily be machine appliqued. You want to avoid a satin stitch because you have those wonderfully turned edges to show off!
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The 7 inch block was destined for the center of the table runner, and after making it the same way I made the larger blocks, and turning the edge, I then used the cardboard template to make another cardboard template, this time a little larger with 'imitation' petals around the edge. I used a protractor to mark off evenly spaced intervals and drew half moon shapes as pictured to make an imitation petal shaped border.
Cut out a green fabric a bit larger than the cardboard template (since I had only half the circle drawn, I traced it on one side and then the other to go all the way around) and used the cardboard to, once again, spray sizing and iron the edges under.
I measured and found the center of the table runner and put a dab of glue there, placing the green curvy edged piece down first, then with a dab more glue I centered the center star block on that.
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I found some green sparkly ribbon to attach as curvy stems, and made some leaves with a different template cut from templar. Here is that pattern:
I glued the stem and leaves down, just arranging them
in a way that seemed balanced and attractive, and then took everything
to the sewing machine. Using the stitch that looks like: _ _ _ /\ _ _ _
/\ _ _ _ with invisible thread in the bobbin and top.
It was then time to quilt. I chose a green variegated to do a tight stippling on the green petals, and a yellow variegated to free motion quilt in a general echo pattern around the pale yellow batik background. Once I did widely spaced echo quilting over the entire surface, I then went back and filled in with lots more in between the original lines. In one corner I free motioned my first name, as a kind of signature, trimmed, and bound with a wonderful purple plaid. I didn't win the contest at TQS, but I ended up with a very cheery spring table runner!
