Skip to main content

Tables Runners - four finishes!

I have four finished table runners to share today - three very different designs and techniques!






First up is a finish that qualifies for the Finish Along - and has appeared on my list a few times now. I finally can share the finished piece with you. This was the very first English Paper Pieced project I ever started. It was my holiday project for Sidmouth in August 2012 and the colour scheme was inspired by a palette I found on Design Seeds.

The fabrics are a bit of a mixture: lots of Art Gallery, some beautiful low volume texty fabrics and some proper black fabrics! The background is Primitive Muslin from Moda, the backing is Nature Elements from Art Gallery and the binding is Floral Elements from Art Gallery.


I finished piecing the hexies months ago and did the applique when I stayed in Budapest in March.


 Basting was interesting. And possibly a contributing factor in my current bad back! It took a lot of time to decide how to quilt it, but I decided hand quilting was in keeping with the rest of the project. I used Finca Perle no. 16 in a very pale pink and bought myself a Hera Marker - how did I live without one for so long!


I even finished off the binding by hand - I haven't done that for a while!

Come the end of the month I will be linking up this post with the Finish Along...

she can quilt



In the meantime I have three more table runners with a more festive theme... the first two are the same design. I wanted to thank two of the lovely ladies at the Church craft club who have made me booties and a little cardigan for baby. I can't knit to save my life and Ruth has made it very clear to me that she can't sew (and is scared of the sewing machine). So this was an obvious way of thanking her and Marion.


The block is Love in the Mist  (you can find the tutorial here) and it's still one of my favourite basic patchwork blocks. I wanted the table runners to be Christmassy but not too Christmassy, so I picked reds and greens, but not with a Christmas print. These fabrics (mostly from the Women of Courage collections from Windham) are a million billion miles out of my normal comfort zone but just right for the recipients. It took a long time to pick the background fabric, because I really didn't like it on the bolt, and Nicola, from my LQS, who helped me pick the fabrics, was determined it was the one. She was right. As usual... (don't tell her I said that).

The two table runners are slightly different lengths as I used different seams as my starting point when trimming the pointy ends. The free motion quilting stipple was just right for the traditional design and despite a tiny little issue was relatively smooth.


The binding made my head hurt - funny angles.... baby brain.... not a good mix. The backing was a good quality sheet from John Lewis which I have on hand to back small projects!


The final table runner is another festive one - this is for me and was inspired by this mug rug I found on Pinterest and all of the matchstick quilting that Leanne has been playing with!

I picked out random low volume fabrics - though in hindsight they should have been lower volume - and did some raw edge applique to attach fabrics for the trees. This was pretty close to improv for me and I really struggled to let go and just let it happen. But I'm really pleased with this spur of the moment project.


I'd been meaning to try matchstick quilting for a long time, and this was the perfect project to try it on. I think this won't be the last time... and the backing is a leftover from the quilt I made last Christmas for a friend - it was the perfect size!

I hope my husband doesn't think he can use these to put his beer cans on...

Comments

Lin said…
A great collection Jennie but my favourite is the hexie one! xx

Popular posts from this blog

365 Quilt Challenge 2016 [A finish]

I can't believe I've just typed that heading! When I made the block for January 1st 2016 I could not have imagined the journey this quilt would have taken me on. So make yourselves comfortable and grab a cup of tea, because this blog post may get lengthy! I'd seen the 365 Quilt Challenge on Facebook. I think every quilter on Facebook must have been aware of it. Loads of my friends had signed up and it kept popping up as a "Page you might like" thing. In the end, in November 2015, I joined the group, had a poke round. Decided it wasn't for me. One of the things that really put me off were the fabric requirements: you needed x amount of dark dark fabric, x amount of medium dark fabric, x amount of dark medium, medium, light medium, light, background.... I just couldn't get my head round those requirements. I'd looked at the mock ups on the wesbite and couldn't bring myself to pick a colour. I put it to the back of my mind. But I had obvious

Hidden Agenda [A Finish]

This is very possibly my favourite ever finish - I know I've said that in the past, but this one is going to be hard to beat. This time last year, I attended a day long lecture/workshop with Tula Pink and it was inspiring. Having not really loved her fabrics in the past (but loved her patterns), I suddenly saw them in a new light, linked with my 2018 new year's resolution to try more fussy cutting). Fast forward 8 months and I confess that my Tula stash has expanded quite a lot. I found some UK shops with older ranges of fabric, splurged on a few destashes and found the odd piece of her fabric already in my stash. The plan was always (and remains) to make a Smitten quilt, but I'm well aware that I have plenty of fabric to make other projects as well! So when I saw the Hidden Agenda quilt pattern by Angela Pingle, this fabric sprung instantly to mind.... and we all know I love a rainbow! And what could be better than rainbowfied Tula? I was ably assisted by my friend Ti

February Embroidery Along [A Finish]

I've really been enjoying my embroidery this year, after not doing very much last year. One of the challenges I set myself at the start of the year was to learn to colour tint my fabric before adding the embroidery - I love buying the pre-printed panels, but I'd like to do this myself as well. And the opportunity to learn this arose in February. Meg Hawkey of Crab Apple Hill Studio hosted a stitchalong to celebrate National Embroidery Month, and the first step was colour your fabric. I bought the pencils she advises,  the blending stumps, something called fabric extender and the pigma pen. And I gave it a go. My first attempt ended badly. Because the one thing I didn't buy was a new, clean paintbrush. So when I came to add the fabric extended, it went all bleary and muddy as, despite cleaning the paintbrush thoroughly, it obviously wasn't clean enough. It was unsalvageable so I started again, and I was so much happier with the results. The practice piece was, in

Labels

Show more

Archive

Show more