Tuesday, December 10, 2013

KISMIF#4--Star Border

Well, it's Tuesday again and time to share another free-motion quilting thread-path.  I'll try to "Keep It Simple & Make It Fun".  (KISMIF)

Since Christmas is fast approaching, I thought it would be useful to show a 5-pointed star.  While a lot of us doodle these little cuties all of the time, we may not have thought to do it on a quilt.

As with all of my pantographs, the starting point is marked with a red star and the exit is marked with a blue smaller star.  Trace the panto in the order of the numbers following the direction the orange arrows indicate.  To practice them for long-arm style machine quilting, trace the panto initially, then repeatedly sketch until you're comfortable on a dry-erase board.  If you use sit-down or domestic style machine quilting, have someone hold a dry-erase marker vertical and in the same spot for you.  Then move the dry-erase board around repeatedly until you feel comfortable with the motif.

This is fun to center in a block and fill with various back-ground fillers such as stippling, loop the loops, ribbons or even leaves!  In fact, this FMQ motif could be added to any back-ground filler and add some sparkle to any quilt project!



So...you probably have noticed that the enter and exit points of the star patterned pantograph are the same.  Is it possible to do a continuous 5-pointed star border all the way across a border?

Yes!  And I'll show you how!  This requires two passes, or one forward and one reverse pass.

Here are some sketches I made one year while attending a Kimmy Brunner class at HMQS.  While the 6-pointed star sketch is the thread-path she taught us, the 5-pointed star I came up with while sketching in her class.

First, I use a quilt pounce to create evenly spaced markings along the border.  These space the stars evenly.



Pass One

Pass Two completes the star.  It can be done either forward or reverse.

I use a leftover scrap of batting to "erase" the quilt pounce markings.  Now I'm left with a cute, evenly balanced 5-pointed star border.

Do you have a thread-path you would like to share?  Is there something you would like to see me do?  Leave me a comment!  I'd love to accommodate and help out!

I'm sharing this post with Free Motion By The River, Fabric Tuesday @ Quilt Story,   WiP Wednesday,  and Needle & Thread Thursday.  Until next time, Happy Quilting!--Shannon