Like a day at the spa!

Bask in the serenity of Jennifer Young’s Wings collection for your next quilt project. It might just make your sewing room feel like a spa! A soothing palette of deep blue, teal, cream and brown, these prints are soft and pretty. Silhouetted birds and flower motifs complement tile and paisley tonal prints, and a range of light, medium and dark fabrics create enough contrast for use in any quilt pattern.

Bring the calm and quiet of this collection into your home with Heidi Pridemore's Wing It! quilt, available as a free pattern download on our website. 

Click here to download the free quilt pattern.

Debby Kratovil also used fabrics from the Wings collection in her mug rug tutorial. Click here to find the tutorial. 

Click here to see the entire Wings collection.

Click here to find the free quilt pattern. 

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Mug Rug Blog Hop: Day 2

This week we're hosting the Mug Rug Blog Hop!
In celebration of fall, a season filled with mugs of apple cider, tea, and even hot cocoa, we have four different bloggers sharing a mug rug design they've created with one of our new fabric lines. 

BYOM (bring your own mug), but we'll provide the mug rug inspiration, as well as fabric giveaways! 

Day 2 features Debby of Debby Kratovil Quilts with the Wings collection for Contempo. Debby works with one of her favorite shapes, the hexagon, to make a sweet mug rug with a fussy-cut bird silhouette. 

Here's Debby:

The colors in this Wings Collection by Jennifer Young really captured my attention. The deep aqua with the browns and taupes are a perfect complement to the sweet birds in the main print. What do you think? I was given 5 fat quarters and then it was up to me to create a mug rug for this blog hop.

Wings Collection by Jennifer Young

I was reminded of a free pattern by Pam Rocco at the Quilter's Newsletter web site for a coffee mug quilt. But, it seemed quite GIANT at a staggering 16". Way too much fabric for a mug rug. I scratched that idea (for these fabrics) and put my thinking cap on.

16" free coffee mug block by Pam Rocco

I was now nervous because I had used a good bit of that gorgeous aqua print. Did I have enough to carry on? Of course! I turned to my trusty pattern, the Twisted Hexagon. I would fussy cut the bird print for the center. That meant I had to make a freezer paper template so I could center the motif before cutting. I did just that.

You can see my technique for cutting a whole hexagon with a standard 60 degree triangle HERE, which was a Technique Tuesday blog post on Sew in Love with Fabric. I was cutting 6-1/2" hexagons using the Head of the Class Collection.

6-1/2" (height) freezer paper hexagon

Then I selected two fabrics for the half-hexagons (cut from 3-1/2" strips). I cut 3 of each fabric. Then it was time to DO THE TWIST!

One whole hexagon and six half-hexagons

You may think that there will be a y-seam in there somewhere. Don't worry - everything is straight-seam sewing. Do you remember how to make a "partial seam" from your garment sewing days? Well, I did and that's exactly how I constructed the first seam. This way I leave room for adding the last patch. Stay with me now.

We are sewing the six half-hexagon patches around the center in a log cabin technique.

First patch with a partial seam

Once the first patch is pressed open, the next patch is easily joined:

Joining the second patch

And all the way around until the last one:

Last half-hexagon joined. Now to finish the first seam!

We twisted our way all around that little birdie!

And how does this look finished? I machine quilted it on my HandiQuilter Sweet 16 and it was done in a flash. I also sewed my binding on by machine - from the back to the front and used a serpentine stitch on my Bernina 1230 (oldie but goodie machine) to secure it. Love this little mug rug! It is 12" high and about 13" wide.

Mug Rug using the Wings Collection by Jennifer Young

Thanks Debby! 

To be entered for a chance to win a fat quarter bundle of Wings, visit Debby's Blog and leave her a note about this collection or the Twisted Hexagon block (or technique). Contest ends Saturday, October 22nd at 11:59 pm EST. 

Make sure to catch all of the tutorials in our Mug Rug Blog Hop!

Tuesday: Chris from made by ChrissieD featuring Sewing Room

Wednesday: Debby from Debby Kratovil Quilts featuring Wings

Thursday: Benartex blog design team featuring Nature's Pearl

Friday: Alison from Little Bunny Quilts featuring Kitchen Love

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The natural beauty of Fernwood

Fernwood, a gorgeous new collection by Jennifer Young, almost looks hand-dyed (it's not). But the prints have the layered depth and textured appearance you'd expect from hand-dyed fabrics. Ferns (of course!), butterflies, a painterly stripe, and subtle tonals come together in a collection that you won't be able to resist! Fernwood comes in two colorways: earthtones and a blue/brown combination, but many of the tonals will blend beautifully in either direction. 

Our website has free pattern downloads for project in both colorways.

First, A Day in the Woods, by Tailormade by Design 

(available as both a quilt and a runner)

 And then, Forest Scrapbook by Diane Nagle

Click here to see the entire Fernwood collection.
Click here to find the free quilt patterns.

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