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Hop on over to youtube to see Jennifer from Shabby Fabrics do a tutorial of a festive Christmas Tree Farm Table Runner!  She used a pattern that Moda Fabrics had and allowed her to share. The trees are red and green on one side and white on the other- a fun reverse effect of background vs foreground. Of course I'm really thrilled with this particular table runner since she's showing it in Splendid fabric!!  Along with the Splendid collection there are pops of red and gold star bursts in Grunge fabric as well as with white and star bursts on the background white. I loved seeing how these trees came together in two sides with the strips!  If you are interested in Tree Farm Table Runner kits, Shabby Fabrics has a few available at their store! Happy holiday sewing! 
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My Christmas quilts featuring my Splendid fabric came back from the longarmer, Marion Bott in Las Vegas (she's @bottmarion on Instagram). Oh I love the textures that get added to the quilts when they have the quilting done! I just want to lightly stroke each quilt and feel the patterns of the sewing.  I'm excited that Splendid is in shops now so you can all work on projects with these too! My next step is to put the bindings on and also make pillow backs and add zippers to the pillow cases (or should I leave them as envelope backs?)  Here is the Showering Stars Table Runner as I'm sewing the binding on. I like the linear pantograph of the quilting. The direction of the lines balances out the long format of the runner and strong patchwork lines of the star trails by going the other direction (horizontally vs vertically).   At the time that I was designing these patterns I had to pick out the binding fabric without having the actual made-up quilt in front of me. That is always a challenge for me- deciding binding recommendations so early in the process (but if it goes in a sales catalog I have to do it early). For most of the quilts in this group I wanted the bindings more subtle and just a complimenting Christmas color, so if the quilt is red, I'm doing a simple green. And in the case of Cardinal's Christmas Wreath, I felt so many prints were on the right and left side borders that a solid or almost-solid was called for.  But when it came to Jubilant Song I had picked the striped fabric for binding and boy, do I love it! Now I wish I had picked a striped binding for Joy and Delight. But my green strips are cut and they are attached to the front, awaiting the hand sewing to the back. I am not going to rip off a whole quilt's binding at this point. But note to future-self, be bold with the stripes!! I recently posted some scrap bags of Splendid fabric in my online shop. There is a limited quantity so when they are gone, they're gone. And I'll be getting a few quilt kits of Joy and Delight up soon too! But for today, a-binding-we-will-sew! I wanted to create a smaller version of Showering Stars that could be used in home decor for pillows and table decoration. Scaling the stars and trails down to half size made it possible to design with these elements for my Splendid collection in Christmas pillow covers and a table runner.  I find I do most of my holiday decorating with red and the red textured background in Splendid is rich and vibrant. I love it! The whites are the cream texture which has a subtle sheen when you see the white on cream background. Simple patchwork blocks and a few longer strips make the trails and patchwork and flying geese make the stars.  I like playing with the mix of scale by having the double stars pillow and the giant star pillow with a much bigger star. The pattern includes directions for making a simple envelope back for covers and its sized for a nice substantial 26" square Eurosham size.  The table runner is sized 16 1/4" x 71". If you wanted a shorter runner you could crop off the trails on the ends or even just use the center stars with trails (making it 32-36 inches long, depending on if you include the last white blocks on the trails).  One thing that was really touching to find out about my original Showering Stars pattern was that numerous people have made it up in patriotic colors for Quilts of Valor. I love this idea! I've also mocked up these pillow covers and runner into red, white and blues to give some additonal inspiration for those that want to explore a more patriotic theme! I'll share those on the next post!  Check out my three other new patterns that use Splendid on my store at shopify and lets get sewing for Christmas!
Joy and Delight is a new pattern I designed with my Splendid Christmas line for Moda Fabrics. I wanted a quilt that showed off the fun mix of fabrics in a layer cake with decorative frameworks for the blocks. But I also quickly decided it was also a good format for alternating blocks of two fabrics- as shown below- my mistletoe greenery and poinsettias which pop nicely against the saturated red texture in the Splendid fabric line.   For an extra pop of wintery fun I decided to have graphic snowflakes surround the outer border. Afterwards I thought this could even be fun for 4th of July in reference to fireworks! The snowflakes are made with subcutting joined strips so they actually go together rather efficiently. There is something really satisfying about making a big pile of snowflake blocks!  I found the Stripology ruler from Creative Grids was a handy tool for making lots of smaller cuts in an efficient way!  And here are blocks with flying geese and framing in progress.  This is a scrappier looking version of the quilt- the original concept using the mix of a layer cake. On this one the framing around the squares is in two colors- red and green for Christmas- and the snowflakes are in a more olivey green. This is next up on my list to make!   Check out Joy and Delight along with the other three new patterns to go with Splendid in my shopify shop. Lets get some Christmas projects going!!  This group of patterns for Splendid needed a quilt with some larger sections to show off the poinsettias and cardinals without cutting them up to much. I liked the idea of vertical columns that showed a few of the prints with the pointsettias as the main center.  To balance out the large panels, I liked adding smaller pieced blocks, arranged into elegant and lacy compositions, to form as a decorative top and bottom to the columns. Thin sashing, like window edges, run the length of the quilt. The result is a group of three columns, reminiscent of church windows, with light flooding through the stained glass images. They seem grand and ceremonial and festive for a celebration.  Many thanks to The Felted Pear (Susan!) for helping me with this and making those flying geese and HST and assembling the ends!  Nature celebrates Christmas with Splendid. I feel like I can hear the jubilant song of either the church choir or the choir of birds out in the trees. This quilt pattern in mocked up into three color versions in the pattern- cream, red, and charcoal. Although this is shown with Christmas fabrics, I think it would be striking with other large scale prints, like the William Morris fabrics that Moda produces with rich jewel tones.  There are four new patterns I'm sewing for Christmas quilts with Splendid. Check out this and the others: Joy and Delight, Cardinal's Christmas Wreath, and Showering Stars Table Runner and Pillows at my shopify shop.    Its winter time again for Clara and the Nutcracker Ballet Dancers! My daughter danced twice in the Nutcracker ballet that her local dance studio put on. It was a fun and festive time and I have sugar-plum-sweet memories of it! What a beautiful time to celebrate with some Nutcracker designs for holiday clothes and decorating.  Available through www.redbubble.com/people/robinpickens... my Nutcracker Suite collection. Freshen up the couch with a pillow. Have a cup of mulled cider in a festive mug. Or find some cute totes and zipper pouches for your own little performers...  Happy Holidays! Happy shopping! And happy, happy dancing!  Visit my Redbubble shop! Click here!
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About ROBINDesigner of colorful florals for Moda fabrics. Modern to transitional quilt designer. Illustrator, sewist, crafter. 
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