Friday, May 1, 2015

Outlander swap tote - a Finish Friday


Finished tote for Outlander craft swap

Behold!  My finished tote for the Outlander Craft Swap.

It started with a plan....

design for Outlander swap

Then, I got to work on the thistle applique.  I used a fusible to help give me a bit of support for those tiny jagged leaves and keep them in place.  Then I used a small blanket stitch to machine applique them to my white background.

Thistles in progress

Next, I moved onto the trapunto for the knot portion.  I have not done trapunto before, so I was kind of winging it.  I put a small piece of batting behind the knot, then stitched on the lines of the knot. Then I used my applique scissors to trim the batting away as close to the stitching lines as possible in the areas that I wanted to be shaded.

Outlander swap item, work in progress


Then, I added batting to the entire piece, and when to work adding quilting to the shaded area of the knot.  I used Cindy Needham's "Scribbling" technique to do this.  She talks about it a lot in her Craftsy class, Design it, Quilt It - with Cindy Needham (affliate link**).  I highly recommend this class!!!  It is chock full of awesome quilting designs.


Celtic knot in progress

When I was all done quilting the knot, I moved on to the background behind the thistles.  Can't not have some swirls!

Next, I turned the whole thing into a tote bag.  I debated making it a pillow.....it would have been a lovely pillow.  But, I thought my partner would never get to show it off if it was just a pillow.  Rarely do I see people walking around town with pillows in their hands.  So, a tote.  A nice, useful, practical tote (with an interior zip pocket and a regular interior pocket too).

My finished tote for the Outlander Craft Swap

I hope my partner likes it!  I used up practically all of my favorite 2 purple fabrics.  I hope she likes purple!


Thanks for reading today,


Jen




Linking up with:





**This post contains affiliate links.  If you purchase something after clicking on one of my links, I may be compensated.

8 comments:

  1. Beautiful bag! I love your thistles and I think the trapunto design looks really cool.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is fabulous! If your swap partner doesn't like it, you can send it to me!

    ReplyDelete
  3. You know I love this Jen, I only wish that I was in your swap team then I could fondly imagine that it was winging its way to me :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. what a lovely bag I am sure it is going to be greatly loved so beautifully quilted

    ReplyDelete
  5. I'm sure she won't be disappointed!!! It's gorgeous! I think that method is faux trapunto - the "real" method involves a cut in the back and stuffing the area through the hole - but yours is the way I learnt and not only is it easier, but I think it's a better & more even finish too x

    ReplyDelete
  6. I haven't seen or read Outlander yet, but this is gorgeous! Clearly appeals to those of us out of the loop ;-) Wonderful color and layout, and beautiful quilting!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Amazing, I am in awe. Thank you for showing this tote. I may try trapunto your way. Happy Quilting :)

    ReplyDelete

I had to shut off comments for a long time because I was just getting spammed. I'm going to try moderation for a while and see if that helps. Please leave me a comment.