Friday, August 30, 2019

Star Light Star Bright - Island Batik August Challenge



This August, half the Island Batik Ambassadors were Showcasing the newest collections in the Beat the Heat Blog Hop.  If you missed any, you can still go back and check them out HERE and see beautiful inspiration for all the new Island Batik lines coming out right now.


The other half of the Ambassadors, those of us with fabric lines coming out a little later, were given our own challenge to create a Star Light, Star Bright quilt.  The quilt had to be lap size or larger and showcase any star block we chose.


I had lots if different Star blocks and patterns pop in my head and then I thought, let me go see what kind of Star dies there are on the Accuquilt website.  



As part of the first Island Batik Ambassador box, I received the Accuquilt Go Cutter with a cube set of dies and I figured I might as well add more dies to go with it, specifically some with odd angle cuts, like stars.


I did a search for "Star" on their website and several popped up.  When I saw the Blazing Star by Elanor Burns I fell in love and it was shipped to my house in a couple days.



This die comes labeled so you can easily know which pieces are which. It also gives cutting instructions for strips if you want to cut out different colored A, B, or C sections.

I cutout the cut peices in no time at all.   I love the notched corners on these dies.  That means no dog ears to trim and clean up.


I also used the accuquilt to cut out the pinwheels in the sashing. The pinwheels measure 2 inch finished so I used the 1 inch finished Half Sqaure Triangle die, another die I purchased for myself. I love tiny pieces and this die cuts these small triangles out nicely and with no dog ears to cut off later!


For the colors of this quilt I started with this orange and pulled pieces to match. I got another piece of this lovely orange in my second Ambassador box and I just love it.

 It is from the Foundations collection and is called Large Netting. They have other colors in this pattern, but I really love this orange. I could have a whole bolt of this and be one happy lady. It has hints of yellow and several shades of purples. 


I quilted it using Hobbs Cotton Batting with scrim binding.


 I pieced together some of my left over batting pieces from my previous projects and it quilted up fantastic and the quilt has a nice fluffy feel to it.


I took the quilt with me on my vacation this week to get some photos of it out in nature.

We were in the upper part of South Carolina visiting one of my favorite places, Lake Jocassee.  The water is super clear and I love the mountains rising up in the background.


On the way to our next destination we stopped by Looking Glass falls in the Pisgah National forest. We love this waterfall.

I found out it sure is hard to get the quilt to hang straight with all the wind that comes off the waterfall. 



Even this far away I needed two quilt holders and it still caught the air making the top puff out like a quilted sail.

This quilt had some great adventures before being dropped off at its final destination in Asheville at some relatives.




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