New Tutorial - Great Granny Circled Table Runner and the Great Granny Twist Blog Hop!!

Good morning cute people!

Today is the first day of our

Great Granny Twist Blog Tour

Where we use my book 

Great Granny Squared

and put a twist on one

 or more of the projects inside.

Kimberly and I used my 

Modern Minis fabric and the

 "Mama Block" 

from page 17 of the book...

to create our

"Great Granny Circled"

table runner!

CLICK HERE

to watch Kimberly's tutorial 

on our easy peasy 

Great Granny Circled block.

I hope you are inspired to

 get your squares out 

and play along!

You will need 21 Mama Blocks

 to make our runner:)

After our Mama blocks were completed...

we "circled" them by 

using the

 6" size from the

 Bee in my Bonnet 

Circle Ruler

A quick way to turn 

square blocks 

into circle blocks!

They are fun... 

fast...

 and sew easy!

I love how scrappy happy the 

circles look when appliquéd 

onto background squares.

 To finish...

simply sew the blocks together

 in a 3x7 setting!

The runner measures  

25" x 53" when completed:)

We cut our borders;

2 - 2 1/2" x 49 1/2" 

for the sides

2 - 2 1/2" x 25 1/2" 

for the ends

For the binding we cut;

 4 - 2 1/2" strips 

I hope you enjoyed 

"our twist" 

on the Mama Block!

Be sure and 

CLICK HERE 

to see all of the 

amazing bloggers who are

 participating 

and adding their own 

 "twist" 

from the blocks in my book

 Great Granny Squared.

Here a few 

of my favorite photos

 from the book:)

Vintage Happy fabric 

in my studio!!!

All of the photo shoots

 for my books 

take place in my home:)

I love the simplicity 

of the blocks!

CLICK HERE

and watch the trailer 

we filmed for the 

release of the book.

In it I talk about 

creating the book and

 about how the inspiration 

for the blocks 

came from crochet.

By the way...

see my Stitchy Fun Sampler

that is in above photo? 

the pattern is available

HERE

I used 6 easy stitches

 to complete it and I

 have a 4 part step by step

 beginning embroidery tutorial 

on YouTube that you

may find helpful.

You can find all four

of my embroidery videos  

HERE HERE HERE and HERE 

We also did another sew along

 when the book came out called the

Great Granny Squared Sew Along

We used the Mama blocks 

to make my quilt that I named ...

"Mama's Crochet"

The basket and the

 yarn with crochet hook blocks

 are in the book

 and used for labels...

but I used them for the

 front and center of this quilt!

And yes! 

I did a label for it as well:)

I used a scrappy

 12" Great Granny block 

from the book

and simply used the

 background fabric for the

 center square embroidery:)

Adding a label to a 

finished quit makes it 

even more special 

to the maker and 

also to the receiver!

If you didn't play along 

the first time around...

it's never too late! 

CLICK HERE

to see the original schedule

 and get the free PDF downloads

 to make the Mama's Crochet Quilt.

And...if you don't 

have a copy of 

Great Granny Squared

CLICK HERE 

to get one!

You can also get the single

 6" Bee in my Bonnet Ruler

 HERE

and the new 

Bee in my Bonnet

"just take one stitch at a time" 

T-shirt that Kimberly is 

wearing in the video 

HERE

And you can get the

Pellon Sew-In interfacing 

HERE

Thanks for joining me 

on the first day 

of the blog hop:)

I'm excited to see 

what "twist" the other 

guest bloggers 

have come up with!

xx

Lori

The Great Granny Sew Along - Week 4 - Mama's Crochet Quilt Top!!! ...

Good morning!

It's week 4 and my stop of the 

Great Granny Sew Along

and time to put the blocks together:)

CLICK HERE 

to download the PDF for my finishing instructions.

But before you get sewing…

Let's chat a little:)

There are 2 ways 

that you can finish your quilt top.

You can make it wide…like mine.

Or tall like Kimberly's.

It just depends on…

 1. Your mood.

2. Your style.

3. Size of your wall where you will hang it!

The best part is ...

ALL CUTTING IS EXACTLY THE SAME!!!

Yep.

That's what I said.

I designed it that way!!! 

You have a choice:)

Go ahead and cut your sashings and borders.

Sew everything up until

 its time to add the Mama blocks…

Then lay it out and decide which version

 that you like best for YOUR quilt

and sew the top together accordingly:)

Choose your inner border and outer border

fabrics …

 start cutting, choosing and sewing!

***TIP***

When sewing your Mama blocks together

or onto the sashings or borders...

Put your mama block rows underneath

because they are cut on the bias

 after squaring them up ...

and tend to stretch a little.

If you put them on the bottom ...

the feed dogs will feed them through

 slightly faster than the top ...

which will help to stop them from stretching:)

Put your quilt top onto the 

Great Granny Squared Flickr 

to enter this weeks giveaway.

Fat Quarter Shop 

will be giving away

 the small set of 

Bee in my Bonnet

Happy Colors

Aurifil Collection.

YaY!!!

Have fun deciding which version

 to sew up for your

"Mama's Crochet"

and remember…

"You are the boss of your own quilt!"

xx

Lori

P.S. Next week we will be making the quilt label:)

A New Sew Along - YaY!!!...

I'm so excited to tell you 

about a new sew along!

I was going to post this 

on Monday but I just couldn't wait:)

We will be using my book

Great Granny Squared

as the manual for this sew along ...

just like we did with the 

Quilty Fun Sew Along ...

so if you want to play along

 you will need a copy of your own:)

The Great Granny Sew Along will begin on 

Monday April 21st and will go for 5 weeks:)

All of the details for the sew along will be posted 

Monday, April 14th on the

 Jolly Jabber 

YaY!

They will be hosting once again…

 because they are awesome like that:)

There will also be 12 amazing bloggers hosting as well…

it's going to be fun and full of fabulous giveaways as well!

The purpose of my post today is to

 show you the quilt that I designed for the sew along

and give you a heads up on yardage so that you will be 

all ready and set to sew!!!

The quilt celebrates the art of crochet

(after all…crochet was the inspiration for the great granny blocks)

It finishes at 40" x 52" and I named it

"Mama's Crochet"

It uses both of the label blocks in the book

 as well as the mama blocks:)

We will also be making a happy scrappy

 Great Granny Block

from the book to use as the label!

You could use one particular fabric collection for your quilt…

 or it's a perfect project to use up some of your scrappy stash.

I used mostly Denyse Schmidt fabrics 

from several different collections for mine.

We will be using 2 1/2" squares for the

 mama blocks and the great granny blocks

so working with leftover 2 1/2" strips or

 5" squares would be perfect.

There is really no yardage requirements for the blocks…

just use your scrappy stash.

When you are choosing for larger than 2 1/2" cuts 

like the basket and the balls of yarn...

 you can see what size all of the blocks are cut 

by using your manual.

As for the background, backing and borders though…

this is what you will need.

For the background you will need 1 3/4 yards.

I used Swiss Dots in aqua by Riley Blake Designs.

For the back of the quilt you will need

 a length of 44" wide x 56" fabric.

I used aqua words from my Polka Dot Stitches collection.

For the inner border you will need 1/4 yard.

I used orange DS Quilts fabric for mine.

And for the outer border you will need 3/4 yards.

I used aqua DS fabric for mine as well.

When it's time for binding you will need 1/2 yard.

I used apple green with aqua dots from

 my Bake Sale collection for my binding.

This quilt also looks very Easter -ish to me ...

 the basket of yarn could double for easter eggs!

What a cute spring pillow idea:)

This quilt was easy and super fast to put together.

I pulled fabrics from my stash 4 days ago ...

sewed it all together in one day and had it bound by this morning:)

I'm "sew" excited ...are you?

Tell me if you're ready to

 have some more 

scrappy happy stitching with me!

xx

Lori