Today, it's my turn for the 12 Days of Christmas in July Blog Hop! My Christmas project is Holiday Forest, a table runner with matching placemats.
Made with a variety of green batiks for trees and a pretty blue snowflake print for the background, this runner and place mat set celebrate the Christmas season in a modern, understated manner.
Constructed with easy to paper piece trees, strip cut units for background pieces, and a few applique snowballs, this project was a snap to put together.
The runner measures approximately 15 1/2" x 44", and the place mats 11" x 15 1/2".
Background quilting is an easy landscape type fill, with the trees getting a simple shape repeat. Both add just the right amount of quilting, so as not to dominate the design.
Interested in making your own Holiday Forest runner? You can do just that, as I have a pattern available at my Etsy store.
Thanks for sticking with me over the last 12 days of Christmas blog hopping! It certainly has been fun!
Merry Christmas and have a great day quilting!
Time to move on from June's Irish Chain Quilts, (affiliate link) and choose another book to explore for the month of July.
The Book of the Month honor goes to Black & White, Bright & Bold, (affiliate link)
a book that has been on my shelf for quite awhile. It's time to make some quilts from my extensive black and white stash.
Over the past 3 1/2 years, I've enjoyed introducing you to different books each month, making the quilts, and giving a brief book review. But due to the treadmill of life, I've been considering moving the Book of the Month feature to a quarterly schedule. My question is: how do you feel about that? Do you enjoy seeing a different book each month for inspiration, or do you have so many projects going that the ideas go onto the 'someday' list? I'd love to hear your feedback, as it will help me decide which way to go. So, please, leave a comment, and I'll let you know my decision next month. But for this month, look forward to a Black and White, Bright and Bold (affiliate link) quilt!
Thanks, and have a wonderful weekend sewing!
Well, this is a first for me. There's always a first, right?
Now I will admit I have a few faint blue marks where the water soluble blue marker didn't come out on the Breaking Up quilt. I didn't follow my standard protocol of marking, quilting, and spraying with water immediately. Instead, the marks were there for a couple hours. When I did spray, 95% of it came out. But here and there were faint blue lines.
So, the quilt went in the tub for an overnight soak. Since the quilt was wet, it was hard to tell if the marks had come out. After washing with a bit of detergent, and a few minutes in the dryer, the marks were still there. Though hard to see unless you're really looking at the quilting, I still wanted them out.
I've heard of products to remove washable blue line marks, one of which I happen to have. It's a Clover Eraser Pen, and unfortunately, did nothing. Maybe it would work better immediately after making the blue mark.
Then, some phone calls. My two local quilt shops carried nothing, nor were they helpful on removal suggestions. So much for product testing.
Next try was one of my favorite stain removers, Dawn dish washing liquid. It's my go-to stain fighter whenever tomato sauce, chocolate, mustard, or grease get on fabric. I heard quilters use it when fabric bleeds and nothing else will work. So hey, why not here?
Again, here's the picture with the faint blue lines, at the arrows.
Here's a picture of the same area after treatment with a 50% solution of Dawn and water.
Notice the lines are gone. For reference, the arrow in the picture points to a blue line that was NOT treated, so you can tell the difference. Amazing!
Being the somewhat lazy person that I am, I was not going to go over this quilt with a fine tooth brush to find every trace of blue line. They are very random, and hard to see. Remember, 95% came out.
Solution? Into the bathtub again for a soak in Dawn and water. Occasionally, I went in an massaged the quilt, leaving it in the bath for a couple hours. Then into the wash.
The result? Marks are gone! I'm impressed!
Again, the before:
and the after, with the blue line marked with a pin, so that I could find the same spot again.
Hooray! Here's another area that had noticeable blue lines, marked with a pin, though I didn't take a before picture.
Not a trace of blue! Sweet! Guess the secret is out - Dawn makes an awesome stain remover! So if you ever run across the blue line problem, give Dawn a try. It's worth a shot.
Happy Quilting!
