Tuesday 14 January 2014

A Sizzix tumbler block quilt


 A friend of mine recently had a baby girl and I wanted to make her a cot quilt. Before she was born I started to make one using Dr Seuss fabric but when I saw the photo online of such a beautiful baby girl (with a very pretty name) I felt like I wanted to make something much more girly.  I have a few quilt dies for my Sizzix Bigshot, in fact it's the reason I bought the Bigshot in the first place so I could use it for quilts as well as papercrafts. I got out my tumbler block die and the Bigshot machine with a selection of girly fabrics and away we went. My daughter even helped by winding the handle on the machine.

This is probably the quickest quilt I have ever made as I started cutting it out at 11.30 in the morning and I was quilting it at 10 in the evening. The shape of the tumbler die makes the quilt look far more complicated than it really was. I only bought this die originally because it was on special offer but now I love it.

I googled three butterfly outlines which I traced onto Bondaweb and used to add the applique shapes.


I did simple quilting in the ditch with a little free machine stitching around the butterflies. I went around the butterflies three times as I've found that if the stitching line is wobbly but repeated a few times it looks like you've done it on purpose!

I really enjoyed putting together this quilt and I will definitely be making more Sizzix quilts. Cutting out accurate pieces has never been my strong point but this machine solves that.

12 comments:

  1. That's beautiful, I'm sure your friend will be delighted.

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  2. Oh gorgeous! Lucky little girl. I'm curious about the pretty name now!

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  3. This is a really pretty quilt. I keep umming and ahhing about whether to buy any of the Sizzix quilting bigz dies but I think I'm going to have to bite the bullet, as projects like this are so neat. I need to make a baby girl quilt too. Could you tell me what size you did yours please?

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    1. Hi Diane, thanks for your lovely comments. I usually do cot quilts that are around 3' by 4' so they can be used as a playmat or a quilt for a sleeping toddler. However I have heard mum's say how useful a tiny quilt or blanket can be to tuck over a little baby in a car seat or pushchair. Hope that helps :)

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    2. Hi Emy. Now that's a thought! But I have decided to go for a grandmother's garden type effect, as I have been working on a few ways to do hexagons and they are one of my challenges this year, as well as dresdens, so I decided to stick with them. I've chosen some ever so cute fabric range called Critter Patch by Clothworks, so I'll try to fussy cut the hexagons and then sew them together. Wish me luck, as I have been practising machine sewing them but I really think I'll have to revert to hand piecing them, since I'm not sewing rows. Anyway, your post still inspired me and it's all part of the process I go to, to select my projects. I am ever so grateful that you share you projects to help with this process. Tumblers WILL happen but just not right now :-)

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    3. That sounds lovely Diane. Sizzix do hexagon dies for the Bigshot too :)

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  4. That's beautiful Emy, well done. What does the Sizzix actually do? Does it cut the fabric? or does it make the templates for the shapes, and then you sew them together?

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    1. It cuts the fabric Olddutch and up to 8 pieces of cotton at a time. You need to get the machine and then the dies- any of the Bigz range of dies and you'll be fine for fabric - even leather!

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  5. That is so beautiful! What a lucky little girl :)

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  6. Wow!! I need to get some quilting dies and have a go - Its really Gorgeous!

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    1. Go for it Sue - I'm just working on my second Sizzix quilt and I'm loving it :)

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