Our small patchwork circle on Facebook decided to start doing things together, taking some interesting pattern (block) and making our next piece of patchwork using exactly that pattern.
The first choice was Morning Star.
Katlin put together a lovely guide to it in Estonian, and with her kind permission I am adding it here as well.
I had a whole boxful of ready cut 14x14 cm squares and another boxful of 4 cm wide strips, which I have cut from earlier leftovers.
I do not throw leftovers into some bag in a heap; I cut them straight away into strips or squares of set sizes according to the size of the leftovers and store them by colour.
In a word, I decided this time to use up my enormous stocks of leftovers rather than cutting fabric by the metre into pieces. So I did not follow the 1/3 proportion shown in the guide but used the pieces I had.
For the first time in ages I had a firm plan to make a double width or king size quilt. As a basis I took the squares of one very sweet flowered fabric and tried to find suitable additions for it. In theory many fabrics should have gone with them, but in reality it seemed that they did not. I tried one and another and a third and a fifth version, but none of the fabrics I had enough of for a large quilt seemed right.
From earlier experience, though, I know that in some cases you simply have to start work and bring in new colours as needed and as possible, to create from something that jars the eye something that gives it pleasure.
I started sewing. I ran the corners in one row and deliberately with uneven angles. So that one ray of the star would be longer and another shorter. There is no need for a long story; the pictures speak for themselves.
The first corners under the machine. In the next picture you can see how I fold each corner back and cut off the surplus. I press it.
Next I started bringing new colours into the pattern: pale blues, pinks, whites. I did not have enough flowered squares for the whole quilt and decided to make a colour transition, lighter from the edges towards the middle.
I drew a design and marked where the flowered squares go and where the white ones. Where the green, blue, pink and white strips go. Where the dark red, blue, pink and white stars go.
Then, with the drawing in front of me and following it with my finger, I sewed the strips of each particular colour and the rays of the stars. Finally the squares and strips together.
The result is in the next picture.
The large white areas I decided to quilt through following the colour transition style as well. I also tried various variegated threads, pale blue plus white, pink plus white and purple plus white, but the result was not pretty. Seen from a distance the result (a trial piece) looked more like a fault than variegated.
Then the usual laying of the quilt's layers, backing, wadding, pattern, and pinning with safety pins. I quilted all the vertical and horizontal lines first, then the edges with free motion quilting, and last of all flower ornaments on the white squares.
For the ornament I drew a flower on paper, marked dots on the fabric as a guide with a water erasable pen and followed them with free motion quilted flowers.
What is free motion quilting? It is when you drop the feed dogs on the machine (the teeth that push the fabric along), put on the relevant foot (the small round one can be seen in the picture) and draw the pattern onto the quilt with the machine. For that you need very good thread, plenty of practice and a good eye, so that the surface is covered evenly.
The quilt is now finished, but the pictures are still waiting to be taken.
The pattern of this quilt has about 2400 pieces; the pattern and backing together took 4 quilt lengths of fabric (4x2.5 m = 10 m) and 2 quilt lengths of wadding (5 m). With a little arithmetic, the length of the pattern and quilting seams came to about 340 m.
Working hours: 75.
Once I can work out a price for the quilt, it will go up in the web shop.
