- Our show today is entitled A Notion to Do Novelties.

Everything from twisted, scrunched up, and puffed for a textured look and patchwork.

Even the print fabric of today can produce a unique quilt like the Cover Lovers cat quilt with its fur like material.

Stay tuned to learn how this quilt combines patchwork and applique.

[upbeat music] ♪ Could you imagine a more clever object ♪ ♪ Warms a body, ignites the mind ♪ ♪ A child sleeps under mother's creation together forever ♪ ♪ The art of the heart and design of the mind ♪ ♪ Puts you to bed one day at a time ♪ ♪ The art of the heart and design of the mind ♪ [upbeat music] - [Announcer] "Lap Quilting with Georgia Bonesteel" is made possible in part by grants from Omnigrid, the original patented black and yellow ruler.

By Leisure Arts, publisher and distributor of needlework and craft publications, including an assortment of quilt books and related products.

Additional funding by Fairfield Processing, maker of Poly-Fil brand products for the home, sewing, quilt, and craft industries.

And by Bernina, delivering sewing technology and education to sewers worldwide.

- It's quick, it's cozy, it's a cuddle quilt.

Patchwork segments that find a home in vertical bars that are stitched on something special.

100% polar fleece which is polyester fuzzy nubby fabric.

This particular quilt made by Joanne Fuller and Connie Pelley are from Florida and they're in my Freedom Escape class.

I think you'll enjoy checking out the system on how we make these very special quilts.

How to start.

I would select five or six colorful fabrics.

You wanna coordinate them to your polar fleece.

They want to contrast yet coordinate at the same time.

I think it's nice to have some border print fabrics to go with that selection because once you cut those in strips, they become the spacers in between all these patchwork segments.

Notice how you can stitch that together, realizing that it's just the seam allowance then that is sewn directly to the polar fleece for your couch potato quilt.

Now I'm gonna start out by showing you each of the segments that we're gonna make.

We'll start with four patches that turn into dimensional four patch.

We'll talk about half square triangles, quarter square triangles, flying geese, then we'll migrate those geese, easy bow ties, and easy spools.

Shirley Newman has put that dimensional four patch into a charming little baby quilt or maybe a special miniature and notice how they have dimension.

They just peek up like that and have all sorts of triangles going on inside.

She's done this in pastels.

On a larger scale, and to always think about how to do a four patch, I'd never cut out one at a time anymore when I realized that for a six-inch, I take half a six-inch, which is three and add a half an inch, which includes the quarter inch on each side.

So I cut out two contrasting strips 3.5 inches wide, do a machine stitch quarter inch, cut those in half, and then realign those, alternating your color, and then marking with a pencil every 3.5 inches I will machine stitch one time in that segment.

Once I cut that apart, look what happens.

I have my four patch.

Go ahead and twirl the back.

Open up that seam so you have a nice flat intersection at the back.

Then you can have fun with those four patch.

It's a matter of going to the center and making a pleat.

I would plead it the same amount each time I go all the way around.

Notice with two times and then with three times I'm simply going somewhere in the middle remembering that I've got a seam allowance at that end.

Once I come all the way around, it's gonna peak up in the air and I find the best thing at that point is to put your little four patch down and let it find a home right like this and keep manipulating it.

So you just keep turning it and turning it and all of a sudden it comes around flat like this.

You'll see it line up on the back too.

Machines stitch an eighth of an inch on the outside edges and then I do need to secure that in the middle, probably just stitching in the ditch.

From there, we will go to our half square triangles.

We remember that for any finish size, we just simply add 7/8 of an inch.

Keep in mind that on the decimal system, that's 0.875.

So we would probably wanna do eight of those at one time.

With your contrasting fabrics aligned and taking that for a three-inch, 3.875 X 2 is gonna give you 7.75 inches.

Two squares that I would cut out.

Once I have marked them on the quarter system and on the diagonal, we remember we machine stitched on either side of that diagonal, then I'm ready to cut apart.

And once I cut apart, all of a sudden I realize I've got those half square triangles and I'm gonna have eight of them.

We're just gonna cut one right now so you can see what's gonna happen and there's our half square triangles.

How about quarter square triangles?

Same idea, only this time, we're turning that right angle triangle so the long side is on the outside and remembering that we're gonna be adding an inch and a quarter.

So I would cut this out four and a quarter for a three-inch, two contrasting fabrics, one diagonal machine stitch on either side, cut that apart and I've got two half square triangles.

Realign those, align again, machine stitch on either side and even after you stitch, it's always fun to peek and see what you've got.

Cut apart and you've got two sets.

Of course today we know with flying geese, we turn so often to the rulers that have the quarter inch all the way on all three sides.

We know that our scale here is the height is half of the base, so if it's six inches on this one, it's three-inches high.

And I would quite often simply turn to my ruler that has a seam allowance included, knowing that if I go to a six and put it on a stack of my different shades of pink and put the six right here, I'm ready to cut on two sides to reveal the perfect triangle that I need.

What's the companion to that?

It's gonna be my three.

I simply put this down on a stack of my dark fabrics knowing I'll need two this time for each side.

So I cut and I cut and I'm all set to go.

Let's migrate those geese.

That's even more fun.

For those, I'm going to give you the dimensions and the scale for a six-inch panel and I'm gonna give you the set for just two, but you'd probably wanna continue and make more.

In this case, the goose is the larger piece.

You cut that out five and a quarter and for every one goose, you will need two skies and the skies are cut 4 and 7/8.

Take that goose, cut that apart on the diagonal and place that on top of each of the skies.

Machine stitch a quarter inch on the two right angles and then you're gonna come and cut that apart.

We'll put our ruler down and simply cut that apart.

And what happens is you have mirror images, the mirror images, find a home right here and right here.

Lots of fun to stack those and continue a long panel.

You've come to class I hope today with your bow tie squares all cut out.

You have three dark and you have two light.

And what you're gonna do is take that odd dark one and you're gonna take it from a square and fold it into a rectangle.

With that rectangle folded, you're gonna take one dark and align that and the other light with the two right sides together.

Notice how in between that, I've got the rectangle and I'm simply pinning that, positioning it to get ready to sew.

Now I come and do the contrasting one over here and the dark on this side and pin so that what you create are contrasting squares with a bridge in between.

Think bridge.

Alright, once those have been sewn with your quarter inch, you can see I've sewn these.

Then it's the old licky finger routine so we can open this.

And with that open, I'm then going to stagger the seam allowances.

Do you see how each of these stagger?

And I'll put a pin right in the center, which allows me to come out to this end and machine stitch all the way across.

Now when I do that, I wanna make sure and catch the raw edge of that rectangle that's been folded inside.

Look what happens once that's pinned and once that's sewn, you get that nice bow tie.

I don't think I'll do bow tie any other way.

Look at Shirley Newman, took all of those in pastels and did a wonderful little cover for the doll bed.

Going one step further, I couldn't neglect spools on this series, so I'd like to give you a wonderful idea for a little spool wall hanging that decorates my sewing room.

This time, we're starting with two darks, eight inches because that's the size of our finished block and that's gonna be the top of our spool.

And then because we're working with triangles, this side, this time that go underneath, we're going to start with eight inches plus, I hope you're remembering, an inch and a quarter.

So we would be nine and a quarter, two contrasting squares that we would cut.

Now most quilters don't make one block, so I'm giving you the dimensions for two of these.

Once you have cut these out, cut on the diagonal twice.

And so these two go in this one with 1/8 inch square and this set goes over here for another one.

And you'll put that together the same way you would the bow tie.

Take that 1/8 inch square, fold it into a rectangle, go to the right angle and align those two and align these two.

See how they're contrasting?

Once again, you're gonna open up that rectangle, come out like so, pin in the middle, and before you know it, once you sew across, you've got your spool done.

A bow tie quilt going all the way back to a farm in Wisconsin where it was made.

I like it because of the bold colors, the red, the gold, the fact that it's strip or bar pieced, and then the idea that the bow tie is done in a manner that I have never seen before.

the design just runs right into each other.

We can take that same idea and use the concept that we just learned in bow tie.

And I've created that into a panel, just the width of the antique quilt or with six of our dark fabrics played against the light, we can put that into a little evening bag and I've machine quilted it with some of our new gold thread and it has quite a flare to it.

I like the old and the new, the reproduction fabric with the new threads.

So look at what we've done here.

Here's the one bow tie block that we've done.

I like the idea that we'd take the third, the odd man out, folding that once again into a rectangle and placing it right against the light and then the dark.

Now what makes this so easy to do is because I have gone ahead and sewn the triangles which form the border on the side.

I've already sewn those to each of our squares.

So then I just line this up, pin in place, and when you'd be sewing, you'd be coming all the way down and catching this triangle at the same time.

Now once you've done one, then you're remembering you've gotta form that bridge.

So I found the easiest way is to come to this corner right here that has to be sewn there and I just come and place it here, put my two right sides together of my light and dark.

And once again, I can just see that I will then have that bridge formed, which allows me, once that is sewn, to bring these together, and then finally I'll be sewing that down and including the triangle again.

So I would just continue all the way up and each time my little square will pop out forming my bow tie.

Now I've gone ahead and cut out some cotton batting to go with my long piece that I have already for my purse and a backing and I've got my metallic thread in.

I've put the hoop so that the outside of my hoop is on the outside and I've lowered my feed dogs.

I've put my metallic thread in and I like the fact that I can slow down the tension on my metallic thread by putting it through a a little catch in the back of my machine.

So then I'm ready to do my machine quilting, with a feed dogs down, I'm doing that meandering or loitering we call that.

And I'm doing just some stitches that reflect the bow tie fanning outward from the center of the square.

As I'm doing this, I like to do a stitch that will allow me to then just keep going or create a link from one bow tie to the next.

And as I do that, I lower my needle into the material, hold it, and then move my hoop so I don't have to cut my thread.

And so once again, I can just go right over that four patch and then start going into the red again.

Now to finish that particular purse, once it's all quilted, I've put together a little mock sample to show you.

Let's pretend this would be my lining and this would be my quilted part and this would be the batting inside.

We're gonna pretend that the easy bow tie is already done.

I would then decide on my flap, machine stitch the end, clip in to where that flap starts and ends each time, and turn that inside out.

Then come like this and like this and like this.

We're just gonna pin this.

The lining has been folded back.

And then on the other side, I have taken the quilted part and folded it back.

So you've got this sort of situation.

I'm going to then machine stitch on each side connecting both of those layers.

And then all you need to do is turn your purse inside out and you're practically done.

The good part is here and your seam allowances are in here.

So it's an easy way to make a purse.

Of course, a gold chain on it really completes it.

Take one more look at the cuddle quilts and I think you'll see even more texture.

Of course, you've probably noticed my yo-yo vest and yo-yos are another accent to put on the cuddle quilt.

I might give you a little tip of the day with this.

I've always thought when drawing up a circle, this was about a 3.5 inch circle that once you turn the seam allowance done that you'd make little tiny stitches but not so with yo-yos.

You wanna make about a quarter inch stitch because when you make so many tiny stitches as you pull it up, it makes too large a center and you want it to be as tight as you can.

I thought I had seen it all with round yo-yos, but what about square yo-yos?

Part of our series will take us to Scotland where I had a chance to discover the square yo-yo for the first time.

Now meet Judy McAllister in the guest bedroom at Park House on the Isle of Arran.

Judy, I remember this room with fond memories having stayed here before and especially the fact that you had just put the final stitches on these quilts the night before we came.

Tell us a little bit about the square yo-yo.

- Well, it is a pattern that I discovered probably about 10 or 12 years ago, not long after we came here.

And it appealed to me because it's quilt as you go, the puffs are actually wadded and stitched together and don't leave any holes like the Suffolk puff.

- [Georgia] And I like the way you've turned them on point because that leaves that jagged edge all around the outside of the quilt.

So thank you so much for letting us use it and passing it across the ocean.

- Well, I think quilting is for sharing.

- I have renamed this quilt McAllister McPuff.

What a fun quilt to make for the first grandchild and a joint effort between my mother and myself.

I use scrap fabric in a setting what we would call snail's trail.

It takes one template for this entire quilt.

It's an odd little fellow with angles coming out here with material cut on the fold.

Now once they're cut out, then you have a production line system going and you can see that you have this sort of shape with each of the four corners being sewn with the right sides together.

And I like to just machine stitch starting at the fold, back stitch, and then come just to the quarter inch.

I'd stop and back stitch and then I'm ready to yank a few threads and then pick up another one and start sewing.

Once those are all clipped apart, then I cut a piece of four-inch batting, which I will pin on the inside to secure so that as I turn this inside out and have the good side showing, I then end up with this little square puff.

I would then put a nice knot in the end of my thread because I'm going to turn down the raw edge a quarter of an inch and then give it a nice yank to pull it up closed.

Once that has been closed, secure that and tie off.

And then each of these can go together with the right sides facing each other and either a hand whip stitch or a tiny zigzag on the sewing machine will complete each of the rows, and then I would sew one row to the next.

As if squares were not enough, what about pentagons?

The same idea can be done taking your five-sided shape, adding the obtuse angles and sewing those together for a wonderful soccer ball.

What about the novelty fabrics today?

Sometimes referred to as conversation fabric.

Everything from sunflowers to fish, musical instruments, why even food, and then fur-like fabric, which leads us to our Cover Lovers cat quilt.

Not once but 20 times, these personality kittens snuggle in bright baskets with tails that curl into handles.

Check out some of those precious names.

Fabric selection becomes an exciting challenge to mimic a fur like image.

This original design by Betsy Freeman was adapted into part piece work and part applique.

So now I bet you wanna know how this quilt is made.

The blocks are 14-inch blocks and really rely on just three major template pieces, the cat, the basket, and the background, which would be these little side pieces and then a panel that goes along the top where the cat is applicated and that would be 7.5 by 14.5.

I like to use the grid grip when I'm cutting out the cat itself because with a warm iron, the paper will adhere to the cloth and it can be reused many times.

And I then would either trace around this and add my quarter inch or I quite often will rely on my rotary cutter and the ruler today realizing that as long as I'm moving the ruler and the rotary cutter at the same time and always watching out for that quarter inch, you see how they're both moving together?

I can just get such a nice...

I'll cut this right here and you can see how I'm getting that nice quarter inch.

It really stabilizes it as I'm going along.

As far as the basket, you can have a fold and fold your fabric into and then I either use a pencil or the chalk roller will give a nice image to then follow to cut out with the scissors.

The ticket for the bottom of the basket is simply to machine stitch on each side up to the inside right angle.

And then I like to then snip right up to that stitching line.

That allows me to then turn this.

Do you see how I can just simply turn?

And I would then turn over and then start stitching at the inside coming all the way up to the top it.

It really will balance it rather than starting here and going down.

And I do the same thing on the other side.

The secret is once again to stop at the quarter inch and back stitch.

With a cat machine pieced in place, that leaves each of these little extensions, a quarter inch on each side free to machine stitch that foundation piece.

It will rest flat, allowing you to then hand applicate the cat to the top foundation.

Once you have applicate that to the foundation, I like to consider taking and cutting away some of the excess underneath.

Notice how nice your seam allowances will press to the dark of your basket too.

The final thing of course are to do the ears and those special eyes.

So once you have those cut out, you can search in all of your novelty fabric and take your template and turn it every which way to get just the special eye that you want.

I would embellish it with embroidery stitches for the whiskers, the nose, and to extend the tail and you're all set.

You might wanna even consider a lilac point Siamese for your next fabric.

More personality fabric, fish of all things turned into a quilt called "First Fish" by Wendy Allen.

This quilt caught my eye while I was teaching in New York State.

The story goes that Mel wanted Wendy to go Bullhead fishing, which is done at night in the cold and rain of fall.

She finally went and things turned out better than she expected.

Wendy caught all the fish, Mel caught nothing not even a nibble, and they never went fishing again.

I'd like to give you a few tips how to do a quilt similar to this and take advantage of some of what we call cheater fabric.

Cutting the fish in half created them swimming in and out of the border.

Extra dimension was added by facing some of the fins and letting them hang free.

The fish are angled, some tilt up, and some tilt down.

Seaweed grew, sometimes going behind, and sometimes on top of the fish.

And the tiny scale of the boat adds extra charm to the huge lake below.

We're gonna end the show today with another wonderful personality fabric quilt.

This time turned into a table cover.

It's made by Doris Callaway and it's entitled "Sunflower Fields Forever."

We're so glad that you joined us today and we look forward to seeing you next time.

Goodbye.

[upbeat music] ♪ Warms a body, ignites the mind ♪ ♪ The art of the heart and design of the mind ♪ ♪ Puts you to bed one day at a time ♪ ♪ The art of the heart and design of the mind ♪ [upbeat music] - [Announcer] "Lap Quilting with Georgia Bonesteel" is made possible in part by grants from Omnigrid, the original patented black and yellow ruler.

By Leisure Arts, publisher and distributor of needlework and craft publications, including an assortment of quilt books and related products.

Additional funding by Fairfield Processing, maker of Poly-Fill brand products for the home, sewing, quilt, and craft industries.

And by Bernina, delivering sewing technology and education to sewers worldwide.