First Look: Love of Quilting November/December 2023

This issue is all about having a Merry Little Christmas with a go-to collection of small quilting projects. During a traditionally busy time of year, treat yourself with delightful designs that let you explore and expand your quilting skills while making gifts for friends and family or enhancing your home for the holiday season. And you can find two sneak-peek quilts from Love of Quilting TV hosts Sara Gallegos and Angela Huffman: the cozy, colorful Frayed Fanfare lap quilt (sew beautiful curves without curved piecing) and the Midnight Frost bed quilt (a playground for your quilting creativity).

Still need more holiday inspiration? Then try starting a new tradition by gathering family and friends around the table to create festive Scandinavian Star ornaments from short fabric strips. Or soak up your favorite music as you sew Song of Christmas, a sweet, framed appliqué and stitchery project. And wouldn’t it be fun to make heirloom Home(spun) Holiday stockings?

Frayed Fanfare by Sara Gallegos

Snuggle up under lavish hues and textures in this chic version of the beloved Grandmother’s Fan quilt: Frayed Fanfare by Sara Gallegos. Richly textured woven yarn-dyed dobby fabrics, speckled flannel, and easy raw-edge machine appliqué are combined in this fat-quarter-friendly design that is a feast for the senses.

Another added bonus? Sara used a decorative machine stitch in a contrasting thread color to appliqué the joined fan templates to a square background patch—no curved piecing required!

Christmas Crossing by Jennifer Thomas

The festive Christmas Crossing wall hanging by Jennifer Thomas brings a little holiday magic to your home. Jennifer artfully selected just a handful of different fabrics and blended tradition with creativity for a sparkling effect. And she used two separate whites in this quilt; the white solid in the Flying Geese gives them a little extra shine and creates a focal point.

As you can see, the single multicolor batik cut into small patches for the Nine-Patch blocks gives the impression of many more fabric colors in the finished quilt, adding rich visual interest to this delightful design.

Silk Splendors by Denise A. Buchwalter-Losczyk

Embellish luxurious dupioni silk scraps for elegant Silk Splendors ornaments by Denise A. Buchwalter-Losczyk. Just look at how Denise cleverly designed these shimmery ornaments to use up her beautiful dupioni silk scraps!

This is also a great opportunity to explore and stitch out all those beautiful decorative stitches available on many sewing machines! And you could also substitute cotton, felted wool, or other fabric types to suit your style. Denise’s expert tips for success are included!

Homespun Holiday by Annette Falvo

And wouldn’t it be fun to make heirloom Home(spun) Holiday stockings? Hand stitch threads of love into linen Christmas stockings. Annette Falvo designed these charming stockings using scraps of felted wool for seasonal appliqués and homespun linen fabrics.

As you can see, their timeless appeal is versatile and will provide a welcoming handmade touch to your home. So we include two stocking versions to get your creativity going, listing materials for each stocking separately so you can choose to make either or both!

Midnight Frost by Angela Huffman

Big blocks + creative quilting make a bold statement with less work. Angela Huffman selected a fabric woven with slightly different colors in its warp and weft in Midnight Frost, creating depth and richness. Adding a single, carefully placed bold accent strip of sparkling star blocks enhances the overall aesthetic.

The result is a field of delight for quilting imagination! Angela employed artful quilting and thread color choices to give the illusion of the blocks floating on-point and suggesting a vertical row of blocks.

Deck the Dolls by Abigail Dolinger

For the little ones in your life, use your scraps to make a timeless, reversible quilt they’ll cherish with Abigail Dolinger’s Deck the Dolls, a little reversible quilt to decorate dolly’s bed for the holidays and beyond. Scraps of sparkly silver and blue fabrics make festive Bowtie blocks on one side; when the winter holidays have passed, turn the quilt over for a scrap quilt of many colors.

Because the quilt is small, the patchwork and thin cotton batting allow you to use the pillow-turn method for a quick finish (no binding needed!). We include Aby’s fun idea for a year-long ‘block a day’ lap quilt option!

More Quiltspiration

And don’t miss the delightful (and thought-provoking!) poem by reader Judy Hey Halberg, addressing her husband’s pondering about why he shouldn’t be included on the quilt label. At your holiday gatherings, try our step-by-step instructions and share the fun of making no-sew Scandinavian Stars. Leah Day enlightens you with 4 Popular Styles of Longarm Quilting to educate yourself before taking your next quilt to the Longarmer, and Amy Chappell of Ameroonie Designs shares her lessons from a lifetime of quilting in this issue’s Trunk Show.

Treat Yourself to This Issue

So, during this traditionally busy time of year, treat yourself with delightful small project designs that let you exercise and energize your creative spirit while making gifts or enhancing your home for the holiday season. So, pick up the issue today, make yourself a cup of hot cider or cocoa, or maybe even some mulled wine, and prepare to “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” What design do you want to make the most? We want to know! Tell us on Instagram, Facebook, or the comments below.

Quilt with joy,
Valerie