Santa Sack Tute - Christmas In July 2015

Welcome to day 1 of the Christmas in July Blog Hop; as always, let me start with a great big "hi" to my regular readers and a huge welcome to anyone visiting for the first time from the Benartex blog Sew in Love {with Fabric}.

Today, you'll find my Santa Sack tutorial at the Benartex blog Sew in Love {with Fabric}. The Christmas in July Blog Hop continues to Tuesday, 28 July, with a new project tute and giveaway each weekday (not Sat and Sun).  

Want To Make Your Own Santa Sack With Different Fabric And Another Size?

The instructions in my tute over at Sew in Love {with Fabric} are to make a Santa Sack from the Happy Holidays Snowmen fabric collection by Michele D'Amore for Benartex Fabrics precisely the same as mine. Still, you can make my Santa Sack using any Christmas fabric and size. To make one to your own measurements, cut 4 pieces of fabric to your desired size (don't forget to add 1/2" seam allowance to the length and width) and 2 pieces of batting cut to the same size; you'll also need 4 border fabrics cut 6-1/2" x the width of your main fabric. Follow the tute instructions as usual and quilt and/or embellish to suit.

Trialling Threads and Embellishments

My thread of choice is Aurifil; all the threads I've used for this project are 50/2 wt cotton, and here's a list of the colours:

Bright Orange #1133 (not in the picture)
Light Sand #2000
White #2024
Wine #2260
Black #2692
Light Turquoise #2805
Fern Green #2888
Medium Turquoise #4182

I also trialled a handful of beads but finally decided against embellishments.

Free Motion Quilting

When I'm free-motion quilting, I simultaneously quilt all sections of one colour to speed things up. I fasten my ends for one section and then drag my threads over to the next section - if you try this method, just make sure there's enough length between the two areas of stitching to cut, knot and bury your threads later by cutting the dragged thread lengths at the halfway point. I ensure enough length in my dragged threads so the fabric can remain flat and not bunch up. You can see how I drag the thread in the photo below.

In the tute on the Sew in Love {with Fabric} blog, I promised to share more detailed photos of my free motion quilting, and here they are:

A reminder of how the Santa sack looks when it's finished...

...and how it could look full of toys on Christmas morning.

Free Fabric Coaster Tute - Available Here Now

Remember, I'll be posting a Fabric Coaster tute here so you can use those sixteen leftover Christmas scene squares from your two panels. If you sign up for emails or follow me on Bloglovin, Facebook, etc, you won't miss it ;D

And now for a giveaway - everyone loves a giveaway, right?!

6 Chances To Win A Happy Holidays Snowmen FQ Bundle

(open to US residents only) 

Here are 6 chances to win a Happy Holidays Snowmen fat quarter bundle - you need to leave a separate comment here on my blog below for each chance:

1:  Leave a comment below telling me one of your Christmas traditions.

2: Follow me here @made by ChrissieD via email or blog reader, then leave a comment letting me know where you're following from. Existing followers can join in, too :D

3: Follow made by ChrissieD on Facebook and leave a comment back here letting me know.

4: Follow made by ChrissieD on Instagram and leave a comment back here letting me know.

5: Head over to Sew in Love with Fabric, sign up to follow their blog by email or blog reader, and then leave a comment here, letting me know you did so.

6:  Follow Benartex on Facebook and leave a comment here, letting me know.

Please be sure I can access your email.  

If you're a WordPress, Google+, no-reply, anonymous commenter, or unsure, please add your email address to each comment. If I can't find you, I'll immediately draw another winner.

This giveaway is open to US residents only and closes Friday, 31 July 2015, at 11.59 pm (EST). A winner will be chosen from the comments using a random number generator, contacted via email and shared at the bottom of this post.

Best of luck!

And The Winner Is!!!
NB: Since selecting a winner, I have replied to many comments, which has changed the number sequence next to each comment. The winning comment indeed WAS #162 at the closing point of the giveaway, as you can see below in the screen print I took at that time, but this is no longer the case due to my added comment replies - Chris

Debbie also shared her family tradition of playing Monopoly on Christmas Eve with both kids. I love that; playing board games with my kids is always fun! I've so enjoyed reading everyone's family traditions in the comments sections; if you're looking to start your own traditions, take a read. There are plenty of great ones for inspiration.

Congrats, Debbie, I've sent you an email :D

If you want to know how to make my Santa Sack, head over to Benartex's Sew in Love with Fabric blog, and there'll be another six great Christmas projects, too, each weekday through Tuesday, 28 July. The projects use a variety of Benartex Christmas fabric collections, and the giveaway on each blog will be for a fat quarter bundle of the fabrics used by that blogger for their own project.

Here's the Christmas in July Blog Hop schedule:
Monday, 20 July: Chris, that's me, @made by ChrissieD, and I've used Happy Holidays Snowmen!!
Tuesday, 21 July: Debby @Debby Kratovil Quilts using Homespun Holiday
Wednesday, 22 July: Kelly @My Quilt Infatuation using Ornamental Splendor
Thursday, 23 July: Kristen @KD Quilts using Santa's Here
Friday, 24 July: Melissa @My Fabric Relish using Frosty Forest
Monday, 27 July: Nikki @The Girl Who Quilts using Frosty Forest
Tuesday, 28 July: Wendy from Ivory Spring using Shades of Winter

Thanks for dropping by and taking part in the Christmas in July Blog Hop - Chris :D

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Disclaimer: Fabric was supplied at no charge to mbCD by Benartex to create the tutorial; otherwise, this post is for informational purposes only; no payment or commission is received on click-throughs to links shared.

"It's The Stupidest Tea Party I Was Ever At" Said Alice

Super, super excited to share April's NYC Metro MOD Quilt Guild Bee Block with you, I'm just loving the challenge set by
Queen Bee Emily N.

The Bee Block package included a piece of green cotton and instructions to create an applique block on the theme of 'Tea'.  Emily is obviously a girl after my own heart and tells us she's obsessed with tea.  We can use any fabrics from our stash as long as we use the green fabric somewhere in the block and Emily suggests to applique items such as cups & saucers, mugs, tiered cake stands, teapots and more.

It doesn't get any better for this English girl abroad, immediately I knew what I was making - it just had to be a teapot and rather than sketching my own to save time I pulled this teapot image by Colleen from her blog justpaintit.

Pulling fabrics was easy - 

in my stash I had this scrap of British Icons: London by Timeless Treasures and then I pulled some Olive the Ostrich pink heart fabric by Laurie Wisbrun.  A multi dot (C3095 White) fabric from the Timeless Treasures Indian Summer collection is absolutely perfect to link the colours together with the given green which I'm going to use as the background fabric for the finished block.

I've an idea to include some of my Queen's Guard ribbon (Berisfords Ribbons - The Best Of British Art 13605 Soldiers) and a strip of Alice in Wonderland cotton twill ribbon too.

The strip of Alice ribbon was given to me by Dee, one of my Late Night Sewing students,

she's used it in my classes to make tea cosies for a couple of her friends and she gave me this piece.  This seemed like the perfect time to use it, thanks Dee xxx

Here's a look at one of Dee's tea cosies too, isn't it fab?

 Back to making the block, here we go, step by step:

I cut the image into sections - I'm not going to use the lid handle so I didn't cut that bit out;

I transferred each section onto the paper side of the Pellon Wonder Under fusible web Emily provided being sure to draw the pieces back to front so the final applique will come out the correct way round;

I pressed each piece of Wonder Under on to the appropriate fabrics

and cut the pieces out.

Emily asked for a 9.5" block so I placed the pieces under a 9.5" square ruler to see how best to lay them out.  I'm opting for a blown apart design, having gaps between each section leaves the background fabric visible and pulls the colours together more.

With the placement decided I marked the outline of the block and the pieces on the green background fabric using a FriXion pen that'll disappear with the heat of the iron then peeled the backing paper from each piece and pressed to fix them in place.  (Be sure to test any marking pen first on a scrap of fabric first to be certain it will 'disappear' from your project - also note that FriXion pen marks are known to 'reappear' in cold temperatures.)

Before fixing the teapot lid I sewed the looped piece of Soldier ribbon in place as the handle.

With everything ironed and permanently fixed in place I freemotion scribble-stitched two or three times around the pieces and within minutes it was all done.

 I love, love, love how easy raw edge applique is and if you're interested in learning more click through to any of my other applique tutes below:

And photos of that finished block

  with a closer look at the scribble stitching,

and the tea pot lid/handle

and a peep at the back.

I've put so much of me and my home country into creating this block, I do hope Emily loves it as much as I do.

And now I think it's time for a well earned cup of tea x

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