by Linda Theil
Alisa made me a beautiful Advent calendar long ago and every year she fills it with goodies in anticipation of the Christmas holiday. Last Christmas, every pocket contained two rolled-up strips from a "jelly roll" precut package of "Holiday Florish Festive Finery" by Robert Kaufman.
I wanted to use the fabric right away and not allow my gift to disappear into my tub of holiday galore. After searching my patterns for a block that could be made with "jelly-roll" strips, I decided to redraw a "Christmas Star" block in a size that would use the 2.5-inch-wide "jelly roll" strips. This redraw resulted in a 10-inch block before finishing, and not including the 2.5-inch sashing I added later. For construction I used the method described by Brigitte Heitland in her "Christmas Star" pattern. This was a free pattern that I no longer find available through her website.
The block looks very intricate, but Heitland's construction method makes it a quick and easy sew. The most difficult part of the construction is keeping all the pieces in the correct orientation, and for that challenge I found using a design board for each block during construction absolutely necessary. My design board is quilt batting spring-clipped to an extra large clipboard from the office supply store.
Another helpful construction tip is the use of "leaders and enders" during the stitching of each block segment. I had heard about "leaders and enders", and even bought a book about using them, but confess I never could figure out what they were for, or even how they were to be used. Well, I finally figured it out and must say the process is a real time and motion saver when stitching small pieces together for this complex block. Once you get the hang of using "leaders and enders" it is a very simple process and not at all puzzling.
You just use a scrap of folded fabric to start your stitching before sewing your seam, and then run the stitching onto another scrap at the end of your seam. So the last scrap becomes the "leader" to your next seam, and you cut the "leader" from your previous seam to make the "ender" of your current seam -- et cetera! There are lots of YouTube videos on the topic, but I haven't explored them enough to make a recommendation.
Some people stitch "leaders and enders" with intent, making tiny, simple blocks out of scraps, but I just used mine as thread tenders. I thought I might become a convert to "leaders and enders" and use them in all my stitching, but found that for me their usefulness was confined to those short, block-making seams.
Here is the quilt with all its sashing and borders before being sent off to the longarm at Rockin' Bobbins in Hartland, Michigan. The background and sashing is a gold figured fabric from my stash with no identifying marks that I could find. The figurative border is from "Time for Hot Cocoa" collection by Conrad Knutsen for Wilmington Prints. The plaid border is unidentified from my stash. I used about half of the "Holiday Florish Festive Finery" jelly-roll to make this quilt. The backing is a dark green, flannel sheet purchased from Lands End.
Comments