A Heart Quilt Sew Along

At the beginning of February my friend and fellow Art Gallery Fabrics designer, Sharon Holland and I announced on our Instagrams that we'd be teaming up to host a fun and quick quilt along using Allison Harris's of Cluck Cluck Sew's Heart Block Patten. I first used Allison's pattern to stitch up a small batch of quilted heart zipper pouch bags and right away I was hooked, I had to make a quilt! After sharing my plans with Sharon, she decided to join me and quickly our quilt along plans were decided!

In hopes to not confuse folks joining us, we decided to have Sharon's blog be the landing page for all the QAL details since Sharon is the author of the instructions for how we stitched Allison's wonderful Heart Blocks into finished 52" x 61" throw size quilts. You can visit Sharon's blog to find ALL the info you'll need to sew a Heart Quilt just like ours anytime! Makers have been tagging Instagram QAL posts with the #agfLOVEquilt, since Sharon and I are both AGF designers making quilts using a combination of our prints, where you can easily follow along to see the beautiful heart quilts being made! Additionally, Sharon created this adorable Heart Quilt maker badge for those joining in to use, as well as an Instagram story highlight reel full of wonderful, helpful videos that make creating this quilt a cinch!



For my Heart Quilts I chose a combination of favorite prints from Amy Sinibaldi's new Mayfair collection + several Foresta Fusion prints that include three new prints by ME! I love this bundle so much that I collaborated with Lady Belle Fabric to carry both a ten-piece fat quarter bundle and Heart Quilt Kit including these same gorgeous prints! For the background of my first Heart Quilt (yup! I made two) I used the AGF Pure Solid in Snow. The crisp white against these saturated, jewel-tones make the colors really pop!





As I worked on sewing my Heart Blocks it was the perfect way to showcase and introduce each of my three new prints in the Foresta Fusion collection! AGF Fusions are a group of ten prints from various Art Gallery Fabric designers that have been recolored and "fused" together to create a new themed collection. I always look forward to adding these newly colored prints to my own stash and the catalog of prints that I've designed for AGF!

First I introduce to you, Mystical Woods Foresta, now available in this gorgeous teal that I originally designed for my Nightfall collection.



Next up is Stay Humble Foresta in my current favorite dusty pink shade, originally designed for my Soulful collection.



And lastly this is Simple Defoliage Foresta, a minty green modern pine trees print that I created for Autumn Vibes.



I hope you love these three new prints as much as I do!

I'm so happy with the fabrics I chose for my quilts! Together these prints created such a romantic looking quilt top, just perfect for Valentine's Day!

This first quilt top is headed to Brooke at Lady Belle Quilting as a gift from me to her, that I'm certain she'll finish with her amazing edge to edge quilting. I can't wait to see her quilt completely finished!



Below is a first peek at both of the quilts I made. Notice I used a different background for the one I quilted myself, a creamy two-tone blender print from Sharon's Spirited collection called, Bright Star Washed that I absolutely adore. It's much warmer than the solid snow, is equally lovely and is extra meaningful to me since it's a print designed by my wonderful quilt along partner!



Below you can see the subtle design on Sharon's beautiful print a bit better, as well as my binding choice, a print deigned by Katarina Rocella for Foresta called Timber that reads as a stripe here and really brings out these amazing Foresta Fusion colors!



For the backing I used my Mystical Woods Foresta print in this pretty new teal that I introduced above. As always Hobbs Tuscany Cotton is my go-to batting, and to finish my quilt I used the built-in wavy stitch on my Janome Memory Craft 15000 set at the highest width and length setting. I don't premark any lines to guide my quilting, I just eyeball to keep the stitch running straight and spaced semi-evenly as I quilt. I love the organic, twisting stitches and the texture it adds to a quilt!



If you're as smitten with my Heart Quilt as I am, be sure to visit Lady Belle Fabric to snag the Quilt Kit or a Foresta Mayfair Mix Up Bundle before they're gone!



I'd also love for you to visit my QAL partner Sharon's blog to see her sugared gum drops and candy inspired Heart Quilt that's super sweet, plus the incredible bonus project she made with her leftover HSTs! Here's a just little peek!



I'm working on making a new batch of zipper pouch bags from my HST and heart quilt scraps that I'll have for sale later this week. Even after making two quilts, I'm not quite ready to move on from these gorgeous fabrics!



Sharon and I had such a great time making our quilts and hosting this spontaneous QAL! It was just what I needed to get me energized to sew again after the holidays and spending most of January designing my Fall 2020 collection. We send a BIG thanks to those of you sewing along with us! If you weren't able to in real time, you can jump in anytime using #agfLOVEquilt when you share and be sure to tag @sharonhollanddesigns @maureencracknell and @cluckclucksew so we can see your beautiful hearts!

xo Maureen

An Hourglass Quilted Pillow {Tutorial} & News!

Hiya friends,

Today my intention was to simply share this new tutorial with you all, as I've finally been back to sewing for about a week now after badly injuring my knee and then my finger, but unfortunately now I'm dealing with more troubles. On Saturday evening around 7pm I was scrolling through my personal Facebook feed when I received a pop-up that read, "session has timed out." I immediately  tried to log back in and it said that my account had been disabled. I then panicked and went to my Instagram app and I was logged out of there, as well, and my login info was coming up "no user." While I restarted my phone, I opened my laptop and tried to login with no luck still, so I checked my email and at 6:46pm I had received a Login Alert Facebook email that showed a suspicious login from "near Elk Grove Village, IL" and I live in Pennsylvania. I read and followed all of the proper dispute claims for being hacked and/or mistakenly disabled through both social media platforms and I finally heard back yesterday morning that both accounts were permanently disabled. What??!! I attempted to respond to that email and I received one final email saying that "your account has been permanently disabled for not following the community standards. Unfortunately, we won't be able to reactivate it for any reason. This will be our last email regarding your account." Now if you read through what one would have to do to have their account permanently disabled, please believe that in NO WAY have I ever or would I ever do anything harmful to anyone on social media! I have simply used it as a way to stay connected to family & friends and now all those videos and photos of my growing three children are gone. I used as a way to build community through a shared love of fabric and sewing and now all 131,000+ Maureen Cracknell Handmade Facebook Page followers are gone. I used it to post pretty pictures and to share news, new fabric & projects of my own work and the work of so many wonderful makers and now all 30,200+ Maureen Cracknell Instagram followers are gone. Years of memories, friendships and hard work. Gone. It's heartbreaking to say the least. I'm trying to hold onto hope that somehow it will all be restored, but I've also decided to move forward with a new Instagram @MaureenCracknellHandmade and I hope you'll find me there! Please, please everyone add two-step verification to your social media accounts. I was not cautious and I have lost everything I've shared for the past ten years!

I don't know that I will attempt to rebuild on Facebook for several reasons, but my making and sharing will continue and it does feel pretty perfect that I just so happened to have a brand new tutorial prepared to share today!



My dear friend and fellow AGF fabric designer, Sharon Holland, has a stunning new collection just hitting stores with a LookBook due out later today for, Everlasting! I'm so happy to have been back to sewing just in time to make this set of pillows to contribute and I hope you love them as much as I do!



What you'll need:

• 8  - 6" charms of fabrics of your choosing, four blue/navy and four red/peach/cream
• 2 - 11.5" X 15" cuts for the pillow backing fabric
•  Hobbs Tuscany Cotton Batting for pillow front and back pieces
• 1/4 yd of binding for finishing the pillow 
• 1 - 14" pillow insert
• Coordinating Thread
• Rotary Cutter/Mat/Ruler

Steps: 

1. Cut eight 6" charm squares from the fabrics you've chosen for the pillow front





2. With right sides facing, pin and sew together two blue prints using a 1/4″ seam allowance. Repeat with the two remaining blue squares, pressing all seams open as you go



3. Sew the two sets of two blue squares together, with rights sides facing to create a four patch block. Repeat this for the second set of four red/peach/cream 6" charm squares. When finished you'll have two, four patch blocks



4. With right sides facing, place the two four patch blocks together, pin and sew around all four edges sewing a 1/4" from the very out edge



5. Use a ruler and place it across the middle of the sewn square. Be sure to position the ruler to ensure the cutting will pass through the point where the stitches meet at each opposing corner. Once the ruler is in place, make the cut using a rotary cutter. Repeat across the other direction to create four triangles





6. Press with seams open, trim away any exposed seam allowances, and square up each block to make four nice and neat 8" hourglass blocks



7. Arrange the four blocks in a layout keeping the blue/navy prints at the center and the red/peach/cream on the outside or visa versa. With right sides facing, pin and sew using a 1/4″ seam allowance two blocks together using a straight stitch. Repeat with the two remaining blocks, pressing all seams open as you go



8. Sew the two sets of two blocks together, with rights sides facing to create the patchwork pillow front and place the pieced pillow front onto a piece of batting so the wrong side of the pillow front is facing the right side of the batting. Baste using your preference with spray or pins



9. With stitches space a 1/2" a part, quilt the pillow front to the batting. Trim away excess batting to finish a pillow top that measures a 15" square



10.  To prepare back pieces, using one of the pillow back fabrics measuring 11.5" x 15", baste to a piece of cotton batting measuring the same size and fold over one of the sides measuring 15" a 1/4", press, fold over again a 1/4", press. Sew along inner folded edge and along the outer edge, staying close to the fold. This will create the double seam finish. Repeat this step with the other pillow back fabric



11. Place the pillow backing fabrics onto the wrong side of the quilted pillow front. Sew a basting stitch all the way around the very outer edge of the pillow layers to attach them. Finish the pillow using the 1/4 yd of binding just as you would adding binding to a quilt



Insert your pillow form and now you have a very cute Hourglass Quilted Pillow!





I hope you love these hourglass quilted pillows as much as I do, but honestly with Sharon's Everlasting fabrics it's impossible not to create something you'll love! My Everlasting sewing didn't stop with this pretty pair of pillows, I'll have another project in the LookBook that I'll be back to share this week! If you give this tutorial a try and you post on your social media, don't forget to share with me on my new Instagram @MaureenCracknellHandmade!

xo, Maureen

Friendship Braids QAYG : :

For my Flower Child Quilt Market booth I made four pillow samples, one including a new quick quilt as you go pattern inspired by friendship braids.  Immediately after finishing my Flower Child pillow I knew I wanted to make an entire quilt using this pattern, combining prints from my new Love Story collection with Pat Bravo's newest, Indie Folk!





This is such a beautiful block with these pretty saturated prints, and it’s so fast! This block is assembled in very much the same way that you would construct a qayg log cabin pattern, but for this one I sewed the fabric strips working my way from the top to the bottom of each rectangle cut of batting which gives the illusion of woven strips, just like a braid!



To make this quilt top I used all twenty Indie Folk quilting cotton and several Love Story prints cut into strips measuring 3" x WOF. Once each rectangle cut of batting was covered with fabric edge to edge, I trimmed away the access fabric and added the trimmed block to my pile. I spent all of yesterday morning and afternoon stitching up blocks and this morning I had enough to piece together this new friendship braid qayg quilt top to photograph and share today!









Isn't she pretty? There's no way I'm done with this new quick quilt as you go just yet! I'm waiting on a new can of basting spray to arrive so I can back and bind this one to add to my shop, and I'm tempted to begin another right away with a little twist, using just Love Story this time! This will be such a great quilt pattern for using up those scraps, too!

Let me know what you think of this new qayg pattern, and if you have any questions feel free to ask in the comments! Happy sewing!

xx Maureen

Pretty New : :

Happy September 1st!

This week I enjoyed folding and photographing my newly stashed Lambkin collection by fellow AGF designer, Bonnie Christine. Bonnie has such a such a beautiful, sweet style that I really admire. Each print had me sighing and wishing my kiddos were small again. Lambkin is the first collection that would have been perfect to sew with for all three of my children when they were littles!



For Haila -- Pretty Twiggy, Keeping Watch Mist, and My Darlings in these soft peachy pinks would have matched her little girl room perfectly!



Jacob, my camping and forest loving boy would have loved Valley View Echo and Keeping Watch Dim! And for Kaiden, who loves birds and used to LOVE bugs and beetles just as much, Wind Observer and Little Entomologist!



These were also the days when for a little while I would knit just as much as I sewed and would have loved a little knitting bag in Lambkin Sir Wooly. It would have made the most perfect bag for carrying around my wool hat projects!



If you think these are as perfect and pretty as I do, you can find Lambkin newly available at Lady Belle Fabrics, Fat Quarter Shop and Fabric.com! I'm sure I'll have a Lambkin project or three to share soon, as well. I think I'll surprise my ten, thirteen, and fourteen year olds with pillowcases to remind them of those years when we still held hands when we crossed the street, and spent our days picking wildflower bouquets and looking under rocks. I'm sure they will tease me when they discover them on their beds, but I guarantee they'll use and love them!



This week I also added a Dahlia and Brown Eyed Susan to my collection of sunflower family pencil sketches. I can't begin to describe just how much I'm enjoying drawing like this again! There was a time when it was all I did, every chance I had. Those were the days before parenting, knitting, sewing, blogging and designing. I didn't realize how much I've missed it. It's become such a nice addition to my creative time and I'm really hoping to stick with it. Perhaps these will be available on future fabric designs or maybe in some other form. Either way, it feels worthwhile to give drawing some time again during my work days.



And since I have a preference for even numbers, I'll have to add at least one more to my collection. Any suggestions?



xo Maureen

Introducing, Soulful!

Monday was the BIG reveal day for my Spring 2017 collection, SOULFUL! Did you see? I'm so excited to finally be able to share it with all of you!

Art Gallery Fabrics first gave a fun sneak peek on both their Instagram and Facebook pages, in the form of a beautiful Wonky Pinwheel quilt block made using my Soulful strike offs, along with a collage including a few prints from the new collection!





Like all things, there's a story attached to this collection ~ Soulful is inspired by family mementos, pieces of nature, handmade goods, vintage finds, and all the beauty that comes from surrounding ourselves with the things we love most. This collection celebrates the gentle spirit of makers, dreamers, and soul seekers. I hope you love it just as much as I loved creating it!



I'm so excited to sew with these colors - the florals, mandalas, crystals, and lacey-inspired prints! My intention was to create a collection that captured the sweet, softer, romantic boho style that I love so much and I'm really happy with how Soulful turned out!

You can view the complete collection at AGF ~ HERE
Retailers can find the wholesale information for ordering ~ HERE

Start looking for Soulful in your favorite shops next month!  And make sure to hashtag your photos on Instagram #SoulfulFabrics! :)

I'm going to be busy sewing with Souldful these next few weeks, preparing for Spring Quilt Market in St. Louis. I can't wait to share more with you all soon!

♡ Maureen