Make a Pirate patch

Make a fun patch to cover up a hole and make a little one happy at the same time. Adjust the size of the patch as needed.

What you’ll need
A hole - like on this much loved pair of sweat pants

Black fabric - or whatever colour you’d like, pink would look cute

A piece of pirate fabric – or you can free motion embroider or draw the image with a white fabric marker instead if you like.

And what you’ll do
Draw a pirate hat on the right side of the black fabric using a light marker. Make sure it will cover the whole hole.

Fold the fabric so you have two layers. Set your machine to a narrow zigzag stitch and stitch around the hat.

Iron fusible to the back of the pirate image and cut it out. Place onto the hat

and zigzag around the image. Cut the hat out close to the seam but without cutting the stitches.

Prepare the hole by placing an oversized piece of fabric on the back of the hole (here inside the leg of the pants). Cover the hole (on the front) with a piece of fusible, a little smaller than the hat.

Place the hat over the fusible/hole and fuse in place.

Pin the corners of the backing fabric so they won’t get caught in the seam.

Remove the toolbox-thingie on your machine to make the arm as small as possible. The narrower the leg is, the more difficult it is to stitch around the patch. Free motion stitching will work very well when stitching onto a narrow space.

Stitch around the hat; I have stitched mine twice, the first seam close to the edge

and the second on the inner side of the zigzag seam.

Cut away excess fabric on the back

and you’re done.

If your kid is anything like mine, you’ll be making more than one of these.

Enjoy!

Make a Fleece border/binding

Use fleece for backing your quilt; I use it on all our “cuddly quilts”. I don’t use additional batting as we find the fleece warm enough for our use.

You will need a piece of fleece that is larger than your top on all sides. I usually let the width of the fleece determine the size. An extra 8”- 10” will give you a nice, wide fleece frame; but it will work with as little as 1” – 2” extra which will give you more like a fleece binding.

Baste the layers (I use pins or spray) but make sure you don’t stretch the fleece during the process (don’t ask how I know).

Quilt as desired; I usually use the walking foot to make sure the layers are fed properly through the machine. Tying also works very well. Make sure all your edges are secured to the fleece, or secure them by stitching an additional seam.

The quilting lines look lovely on the back

and so does the excess fleece.

Measure the width of your narrowest side

making sure all the selvages will be chopped off.

Marking this width with sticky notes will prevent mistakes (don’t ask how I know).

Trim all 4 sides to the desired width.

Bring all threads to the front and tie them.

Cut them off leaving an inch or so.

Fold the fleece over the edges of the top with an approx ¼” overlap. Use a lot of pins to secure.

I used to spray baste them with this little spray can;

just a narrow line of glue along the edges of the top.

However, I found myself adding pins here and there anyway, so I dropped the spray. Try it if you like; it’s much quicker.

Fold the corners like this

then the edges over

to make a mitered corner.

Finger press (red line) and chop off the excess fleece triangle

just leaving a approx ¼” seam allowance.

Pin the corners; both edges

and the mitered folds together.

Start stitching around the fleece edge using a walking foot. I stitch at least 3 seams all the way around; the first, one close to the edge and one on the other side of the first.

Smooth out any bumps on the way by lifting your pressing foot with the needle down and adjusting any excess fleece. You can cut off little bumps and pleats that get caught in the seam afterwards; fleece is very forgiving.

See?

Stitch the mitered corners by hand.

Finished! And in no time at all!

Make a Banner

This scrappy banner is easy to make; you get something pretty and your scrap bin gets a little less crowded. Win win, right?


Choose fabrics and letters that suits the occasion; this name banner was made for a new baby boy.

What you’ll need
Fabric scrapsFusible web
Background fabric; choose a solid fabric or one that reads as solid for the letters to show.
Tulle or netting
A printout of your letters

And what you’ll do
Print out the letters you want to use; I have made mine in Word using the font Tekton Pro Ext, bold and in size 300. If you have the option to print a reverse document, do so.
If your letters are the right way; make a mirror image by tracing around them on the printout using a marker that will show through the paper. Draw the lines properly on the wrong side of the paper (see my Make a Letter tutorial).

Cut a strip of fusible web as wide as you want your mid section to be. Make it as long as possible, and adjust the length later. I am sorry, I forgot to measure mine and the quilt is given away, but I think my strip was approx 6” wide.
Draw your reversed letters onto the fusible strip exactly the way you want them to appear on the quilt. This means lining them up properly and using the same space between the letters (sorry, no pictures of this step).

Place the fusible strip on your ironing table, glue side up, and start covering it with little pieces of fabric.
Make sure the fabric pieces overlap properly in every direction and let them go over the edges. Fuse the scraps to the web.
Using sharp scissors, start cutting out the letters. Save the negative spaces of letters like O and A.

Turn over and check that you have cut away all the layers.
Clean up the edges with a rotary cutter and remove the paper carefully.
Place the fused piece on the background fabric, including the “holes” from Os and As etc. Fuse into place.
Layer the top with batting and batting.


Cover the fabric scraps with a piece of tulle, and pin.
Start quilting. I have quilted vertical lines using the walking foot and a light thread matching the background fabric. I started with the tulle covered mid section, stitching the first line one presser foot’s width left of the fabric scraps and kept quilting lines through the mid section all the way over to one presser foot width right of the scraps.
Cut away the excess tulle close to the stitching lines on both sides of the mid section.

Continue quilting the background.

Add hanging triangles and binding and you’re done.

Have fun and let me see your scrappy projects!