Do you remember this kit that I bought from the Festival Of Quilts back in August? It's "Christmas Eve" by Lynette Anderson Designs, and was prepped and ready to take along to the sewing group on Monday evening. The design was traced onto the background fabric using a Micron Pigma pen (I prefer to use a light brown, with a very fine nib) and weaveline interfacing was fused to the back of the pieced cushion front. I made quite a good start with the applique, then added the stitchery...
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...the stitchery was soon completed, using 2 strands of embroidery threads. The final reindeer must be Rudolf, as he has a very red nose! I always use a wooden embroidery hoop, as it keeps the background fabric nice and taut. When the hand work is completed, it gets a good press on the reverse. I find putting a clean thick towel on the ironing board and laying the project face down prevents it from going flat, and gives a very good result...
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...the cushion front was layered with some thin cotton wadding, and a piece of calico, and was then ready for quilting. Using a cream King Tut quilting thread, and a Schmetz Topstitch size 70 needle, I quilted "stitch-in-the-ditch" around the cream centre square and the cream border. I then used a burgundy coloured Mettler quilting thread and quilted "stitch-in-the-ditch" around the red inner border, and quilted a few straight rows around the outer border, about 0.5" apart, using the edge of the walking foot as a guide. The back was made with some feature fabric from the Winter Village collection (this was included in the kit) and I added a double layer of calico for the top part, as I like using an enclosed zipper for my cushions. There is a great tutorial here, that is very similar to the method that I use...
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...I used a single fold binding to cover all the raw edges once the front and back had been stitched together, then filled it with a feather pad. I always use a pad that's slightly bigger than the cushion cover, so it really fills it out and makes it nice and plump. I love these reindeer flying around the border, and reindeer will feature in my next festive project too.
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