Sew Lux – Hand Quilted Sketch Book Cover
Full details on sponsors and prizes here.
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Today we’re welcoming Chrissy of Sew Lux Fabric to share with us. Chrissy is one of my oldest blogging friends, we first met when she and her mom had just opened their shop, and were just getting started ourselves. We’ve worked together on a variety of occasions, so we were glad to have them join us as a sponsor and contributor to our series. I love the idea of hand quilting with perle cotton thread {I have a bit of a stash of it!}, so I may just be making one of these soon!
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My name is Chrissy and I co-own Sew Lux Fabric with my mom. I was thrilled to accept Jennie & Clara’s invite to participate in the Season by Hand Series for a few reasons: (1) We love working with Jennie & Clara and (2) well, I considered it a challenge to come up with something “by hand.” 🙂
I don’t often do a lot of hand work, but I love English Paper Piecing (EPP) projects. They always look beautiful and I admire those who use the technique a lot. I am working on a Jazz Hands project from Sarah Fielke’s book, Material Obsession Two, off-and-on.
That’s about all I have so far!  We’ll see how much I can get done this summer, though my addiction to playing Candy Crush might get in the way!  🙂
I also love the look of hand quilting, but need to practice before I feel confident to tackle a big project, which is where my project for Season by Hand comes in …
Usually, when I travel or am away from my machine, I often have a sketch book with me. Â I always find myself daydreaming of things I want to make, or am jotting down a to-do list, or just want to record a pattern or idea that inspires me … and its nice to have a pretty (and refillable) notebook to do all of that in. Â I thought a cover for just such a notebook would be a great way to practice my hand quilting.
I adapted a pattern for this sketchbook/notebook cover – you can read more about that in a pseudo-tutorial here on my blog. Â But I wanted to show the hand stitched portion of it here on this blog post.
Perle cotton thread is so pretty and comes in a wide variety of colors. Â It’s great for embroidery (as Jennie & Clara often demonstrate), but it is also great for hand quilting.
I prepped a piece of Moda Crossweave in Natural with some interfacing to keep it from being wiggly and then pinned it to some plain white flannel. Â (I chose to use flannel in this instance to avoid the bulk of batting and backing later in my project.) Â I marked a 2 inch grid using my quilting ruler and got to work. Â (If you look closely in the photo above, you can see the blue lines I drew as a guide.)
I just used a basic running stitch in Perle Medium Sea Green on the lines.  And then went back eyeballing about 1/4″ to the right of the initial grid with Light Violet.  You can see that I just went for an organic stitch – they aren’t perfectly straight or evenly spaced, but I think it adds to the charm of it.  🙂  If you are a little OCD, the Tiger Tape guides can be very helpful.
When I got to to the end, I just tied a simple knot to hold the threads in place as they will end up in a seam allowance later on.
This was a pretty quick process while I watched the latest stage of the Tour de France.  🙂
From there I finished the quilted piece of Crossweave into a notebook cover sized to fit a standard composition book. Â You can read more about the pattern I used and how I modified it here.
Of course, you could prep pieces for hand quilting before traveling and work on them while away. Â They could then become clutches, pillows, table runners, placemats – whatever you wish! Â I hope you’ll try you hand at some simple hand quilting this summer.
Happy Sewing!
– Chrissy 🙂
The hand quilting looks great on the crossweave! Very pretty!
The texture looks great! Thanks for sharing:)
Very nice…hope you had fun making it. I may have to try some quilting with perle cotton.
I love the simplicity of your notebook cover; it would be a great take-along project.
That’s so pretty! I love your notebook cover! 🙂
Really pretty and simple hand quilting. I love EPP too.
I can’t wait to see more of your Jazz Hands project…..I love EPP! I also love the simplicity of your notebook cover….this would make a great gift for a man. Thank you!
your hand stitching is really nice. love your piecing block too. thanks for sharing.
The cover looks great!
That’s lovely – I like the bright colors on the more muted linen.
What a great project – even someone who doesn’t have embroidery experience could do this successfully! Great gift idea too. Thanks for the inspiration!
I have been inspired to hand quilt, or at least attempt it! Thanks for the informative series!
Gorgeous hand quilting.
i love your handiwork, you are very good! i have quilted for over 40 years and have never owned a sewing machine. i have hand pieced and hand quilted over 200 quilts and given them all to charities such as cancer awareness, church raffles, neonatal icu, and humane society. hand quilting is not as popular as it once was because people live such busy lives. keep up the great work. barbara babscorbitt@gmail.com
Awesome!! Love the colours! My 2 favs 🙂
Very nice idea…..lovely.
Really love the English Paper Piecing. I haven’t tried using the “Jewel” Shapes (I think that is what they are called) yet but I really want to. They are so beautiful.
I’m trying hand-quilting on a few projects right now for the first time – small projects first before trying a small quilt! I need to continue practicing, as the stitching on the back of my projects isn’t as nice as on the front. Practice, practice, practice (sigh!).
Wow – I am somewhat surprised, but not really, Carrie! Your hand work is outstanding! One of these days I just may give hand piecing a try!
Cheers!
What a sweet, simple project!
what a pretty idea!
The blog is really informative and i like to share it with my friends.I love to come back on a regular basis, please post more on the subject.
What a super cute notebook cover!
This is such a great tutorial. Thanks so much for taking step by step photos.
I had to quit Candy Crush, I wasn’t getting anything done! Love the shape of your EPP, I’m going to branch out beyond hexies soon 🙂
That is really lovely.
However a few years back I started quilting using perle cotton number 8. I instantly felt I had found the quilting thread I had been looking for all my life! It adds an extra texture to your patchwork with it’s beautiful sheen and colours, and more importantly it is thick enough for you to actual notice it! Why put hours into hand quilting just to see a slight indentation? That’s a bit harsh but hopefully you know what I mean. So now I use perle cotton all the time, and usually I include as many colours as I can in each project.