Stitch Therapy Monday

Not even below zero temp can stop us quilters from getting to the quilt shop!

It was a fun morning even though it was a bit difficult to get around the room to see what everyone is planning for their Wish Quilt. There are going to be a lot of fun versions and I can't wait to see them all finished.

The Morning Session.
(Thanks to Val for sending me photos of the group.)
This is just half of the room--just about a full house.
I was checking out Anne's fabric selection--yummy! 

The Afternoon Session
You can see there's a lot more room in the afternoon class.
I even got to sit during Susan's "What's New" presentation.
If you are signed up for the group,  your are welcome to attend whatever session is most convenient for you, BUT
you will have a lot more elbow room (and attention!) if you come to the afternoon session! 

We are working on the first section that contains the Santa block. If you finish the embroidery, you can start piecing the other components or, if you like, keep stitching! Susan is planning to have the Ultra Suede that I used for the reindeer blocks before the February meeting and I will show you how I did those blocks next month. 

Ultra Suede applique coming in February!

You can download the first block here: Santa block. 

Since I don't particularly enjoy working the Satin Stitch, I opted to tint those areas with crayons and colored pencils. It also saved me a lot of time stitching! (Okay, I'm just plain lazy!)

The Wish Quilt is a free on-line pattern by Bronwyn Hayes and all of the information can be found HERE. 

Sorry the photo is a bit blurred--my battery needed to be charged.

I did a little embellishing with fusible crystals after the quilting had been finished.
I omitted many of the French  Knots on the quilt and subbed the crystals or used them to highlight stars or trims.
I did do all of the EYES with 3 wrap French Knots--crystal eyes would be a little scary! 

My method of fabric tinting:

• After tracing the pattern onto the background fabric, iron freezer paper to the back of the fabric block. The freezer paper helps stabilize the fabric while you are coloring. Be sure you have your block on a smooth surface to avoid "texturing" your tinting. 
• Lightly color the areas you want tinted. It's better to go light and add more color later, if desired. You can always recolor to add more saturation to an area after pressing. 
• I use Crayola crayons since they have a lot of pigment. There are also crayons specific to fabric but they aren't necessary. 
• It's probably a good idea to lay some newspaper on your pressing surface just in case the wax from the crayon leaks though. Lay the tinted block on the prepared pressing surface, cover with a clean paper towel and using a hot iron, press the tinted areas without moving the iron around. You are just removing the wax (which just takes seconds if the iron is hot enough) and setting the color into the fabric.
• Do not use the paper towel on another area--you may transfer color or wax to an undesirable area. You can guess how I know THAT! 
• Before you remove the freezer paper from the back, you may want to shade or intensify the color with colored pencils. I have used Berel Prismacolor and Faber Castell Col-erase pencils with great success.  I can't vouch for color fastness, as I have only used them on wall hangings that I don't intend to wash. 

I hope I remembered to cover everything! If you are working on the Wish Quilt along with us and have any questions, I am happy to try to help.