Looking Back with Island Batik

Welcome to April's Island Batik challenge: Looking Back Vintage Quilts Inspiring New Creations.

I have always wanted to make a 6 pointed star quilt. There's something about them that draws me. While I love English Paper Piecing, there isn't a lot of time in my world for that right now, so my take on creating something new from vintage was to search for a way to make the 6 pointed star without needing the paper piecing part.  If you do a search, you will see I'm not the only one who has had that thought, but thankfully, we can use their methods and not come up with something new. Frankly, they had me at strip piecing.

Fancy numbering system

I chose to use the method shown here by Carla of Kits by Carla. After watching her video I ordered the shortcut sheet, downloaded it and got started.

I chose to use the bright colors from the Southern Blooms fabric given to me from Island Batik as part of their Ambassador program. I chose the brightest colors from the grouping I received, because I felt they had a less vintage-y feel. Of course, I think I zeroed that out with the yellow background, which always makes me think of vintage.

While she shows you how to trim a 60 degree angle, if you have a 60 degree ruler, save yourself some time and use it. It's just easier. Don't be like me and take 24 hours to remember you actually HAVE a 60 degree ruler.

This time when sewing, and quilting, my batiks I used a 70/10 size needle. My longarmer recommended going smaller, not larger with my needle, as recommended by those that sell the longarm machines. It sewed and quilted fabulously, and didn't sound quite so much like punching through the fabric.

Once your stars are pieced you get to do my favorite thing: trim to size. I love trimming to size for the pure accuracy of it.

Once I had my stars made it was time to decide on a layout. Part of the reason I chose the on-point layout was becasue I liked how it looked, the other part was, I could get away with only making ten stars (per the instructions, though I only used nine)  and still reach the required size. Shhhhhh.

I kind of felt like the plain setting squares were, well, plain.

I added a few colored pieced to them to see if I liked it better and decided against it. I really preferred the plain in the end.

Quilting, as always, was the hard part. I struggle with quilting motifs, and always go back to the good ole walking foot. This time, while I still did "lines" I did do it free hand. I found the perfect yellow verigated thread at my LQS, and just went for it. I didn't quilt the border or the stars, and did a scrappy binding.

I used a piece of the batting given to me from Hobbs Batting through the Island Batik Ambassador program. For this one I used their Heirloom Premium 80/20. It's a very soft batting, that feels a little thinner than the batting I usually get, but I think it would be perfect for a summer quilt, or a baby quilt that you want to be soft and cuddly.

Voila! My vintage inspiration made new.
PS 20 mph winds *will* blow through a fence and mess up your nice quilt.

Would you have added the added color in the setting squares? Let me know in the comments.
Happy Stitching!
Jen

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