Heart of the Home Sew-Along: Fabrics, Stars, & Hearts

Hello, friends! Today I’m stopping in with my first post for the Heart of the Home Sew-Along: Fabrics, Stars, & Hearts. I was planning on posting this later this week, but the positive response to this quilt-along sponsored by All People Quilt has been wonderfully overwhelming, so I didn’t think anyone would mind if I posted a little early. Keep reading to see my fabric pull, find tips and helps for sewing the sawtooth star and heart blocks, and find out at what is coming up next.

Heart of the Home Sew-Along: Fabrics Stars, & Hearts

Fabrics for my Heart of the Home Sew-Along Quilt

I’m sewing along following the All People Quilt schedule but making a 9-block wall hanging. It’s going to finish at such a nice size, and I’m going to use three each of the star, heart, and house centers in my layout. I’ve decided to use our upcoming Laguna Sunrise collection for my Heart of the Home Sew-Along quilt. These fabrics, like the Strawberry Lemonade collection I used for my original quilt are bright and happy! This collection also has a nice selection of prints with light backgrounds that will work well for the light sections of the log cabins. I’m super excited to get this put together!

Tips for Making Sawtooth Star Blocks

The sawtooth star blocks for this quilt might be just a little smaller than what you are accustomed to making, especially if you are a new or beginner quilter. But there are a lot of tips I have to help you with these blocks. (Please note that if you do decide to use a specialty ruler for your flying geese that you may need to make adjustments in your cutting that are different than the pattern instructions).

• First, since the pieces are small, you may want to lightly spray your fabric with this product before cutting. I’ve really found this to be helpful especially when sewing with smaller pieces.
• You’ll also find helpful tips for sewing with smaller pieces here.
• And you can watch my video on tips for piecing small pieces here.
• Read my blog post with tips on perfect flying geese blocks here.
• Watch my Flying Geese Unit Tutorial Here
• See the Creative Grids Flying Geese tool Ruler Tutorial Here
• Watch my Sawtooth Star Block Tutorial Here

Tips for Making Simple Heart Blocks

You’ll find that the heart blocks are a breeze, especially after making your small sawtooth stars. I use the Mini Simple Folded Corners Ruler to add all of the squares to my heart pieces. By using this ruler, you won’t need to draw lines with a pencil, either!

• Using the spray I mentioned above will also be helpful with these heart blocks.
• Be sure to follow the pressing arrows shown in the magazine so that the pieces of your heart blocks will “nest.”
• See the Mini Simple Folded Corners video here.
• Watch my video with tips for Simple Heart Blocks

Coming Soon

I’ll be making my house blocks next and will also be getting my strip sets cut for the log cabin units. Watch for another blog post later this month where I’ll go over all of my best tips for both of those topics (house blocks and log cabin block sewing). I’ll post a wrap-up video after my quilt has been assembled, quilted, and bound.

Happy Quilting!