Fat Quarter Shop, Sew Sampler Box

Fast and Flurrious Table Runner and Wall Hanging

The colors and patterns of this Cider fabric are something I wouldn’t have immediately chosen, but I grew to love them as I worked on this project. The fabric and table runner pattern came in a Sew Sampler box.

This was an easy, relaxing project and it was perfect to bring along to a quilt retreat I attended in September 2021. It’s comprised of two different types of blocks, so it was nice to assembly-line sew these and then lay them out to create the rows.

The table runner pattern was written to be even longer, but I modified it and used the remaining fabric to make a wall hanging.

I cycled through a few quilting designs for each shape and added some simple straight lines to the border.

Finished Size: 18.5" x 58.5" for table runner, 26.5" x 27" for wall hanging
Pattern: Fast and Flurrious exclusive to the Fat Quarter Shop Sew Sampler Box for January 2021
Fabric: Cider by BasicGrey for Moda Fabrics
Fat Quarter Shop, Sew Sampler Box

Cupid Box 2021 – Pillows, Table Runner and Wall Hanging

Just a day before Valentines’ Day and I’ve finished a lovely set of decor! These projects were inspired from the 2021 Cupid Box from Fat Quarter Shop.

The annual Cupid Box from Fat Quarter Shop is a mystery box filled with fabric, a pattern, and exclusive accessories/notions for the holiday. This was my first time getting this box and I was pleasantly surprised! It included a bunch of heart goodies like: clips, a handy tape measure, key ring charm, and ruler grips. The featured fabric was a stack of fat quarters from the “From the Heart” line by Sandy Gervais and an exclusive panel with large images of typewriters, love letters, and phones. There was an exclusive pattern to make a quilt from this fabric, but I went my own way and created some Valentine decor for my house.

Pillows
I started off making two pillows featuring the large typewriters from the panel. I pieced together squares from the fat quarters to make an outside border. This turned out to be much more difficult than expected because of all the math involved! The typewriter image wasn’t exactly square, so even when I figured out the measurement the border needed to be for two of the sides, I couldn’t copy it for the other two sides and had to adjust the size of my white spacer squares to cover the difference accordingly. It all turned out decently, but by this point I was already regretting branching out and wishing I had a pattern to follow!

Table Runner
Next up was a table runner. I was determined to use up as many images from the panel as possible! I really liked the heart blocks that were included in the quilt pattern, so I made those as designed, but added white borders around them to make them the same size as the love letter and phone images from the panel. I thought surely this would help me put the pieces together easier! Unfortunately, I found that while those blocks lined up nicely with each other, they didn’t line up perfectly with the typewriter (which still wasn’t square!). After trying out a few layouts I decided to add a red border around some of the edges to make the two sides the same height as the typewriter. The design definitely changed from my original vision, but I’m happy with how it turned out.

Wall Hanging
At this point I was ready to be done with these projects, but I still had more panel pieces to use up! 🙂 I had also premade a bunch of hearts when I made the table runner (smart move), so I had some blocks ready to work with. I decided to keep it as simple as I could and cut up strips of the remaining fat quarters to use as sashing around the blocks. I didn’t have enough pieces of each fabric to make solid strips, but I actually like the scrappiness of it!

All in all, I’m very happy with this set of projects! However, I learned that I don’t dream of becoming a pattern designer and instead can’t wait to follow someone else’s math next time!

Finished Size: 20" x 20" for Pillow Covers, 42" x 14.5" for Table Runner, 22.5" x 22.5" for Wall Hanging 
Fabric: From the Heart by Sandy Gervais for Riley Blake Designs
Fat Quarter Shop, Sew Sampler Box

Jolly Box 2020 – North Pole Quilt

This quilt was actually made by my 9-year-old daughter! Her first quilt! The pattern and fabric came from the Fat Quarter Shop Jolly Box 2020. When the box arrived, she was immediately excited about this fabric and since it looked like a good beginner quilt I told her she could do it!

We added an extra outside border to make it a bit bigger (closer to a lap quilt size for her) and backed it with super soft Fireside by Moda to make it cuddly. It was my first time using Fireside and I love it! I had no problems quilting it with the longarm. I’ve got another piece of Fireside waiting for the back of my cat quilt when I make it.

For the quilting, my daughter and I picked out a couple designs from Designs with Lines books (Border Lines and Basic 8) and used Pam Clarke’s stencils and chalk pounce powder to create a guide. I outlined the deer — well, half of it — and my daughter got on the longarm for the first time to finish it up. She did a great job and luckily has the attitude that “nothing is perfect, Mom!” so she just went for it and wasn’t afraid of mistakes.

She loves her new cute, cuddly couch quilt!

Finished Size: 37.5" x 46.5"
Pattern: North Pole Quilt Pattern exclusive to the Fat Quarter Shop Jolly Box 2020
Fabric: Deer Christmas by Urban Chiks, Fireside Pink by Moda

#jollybox
#sewsamplerbox