Snowflake Among the Stars

Photo taken between rain showers on a cold, windy day

Snowflake Among the Stars started out as many quilts do...with the announcement of an exciting life event. My dear friend, M, shared with me the news that her daughter {also an M} was going to be married! I've know this younger M since she was a precious little four year old :o)

With a wedding date set for mid-December it was a fun opportunity to make a quilt that not only celebrated the marriage of this couple, but could be used each Christmas. The quilt started with this dynamic snowflake as a central medallion. This pattern, Snow-Kissed Star, is designed by Konda Luckau of Moose on the Porch Quilts, and was featured in the Nov/Dec 2011 issue of McCall's Quilting. It's such a bold design and I love how it lets you use all the beautiful fabrics in a jelly roll.  

The pattern in the magazine called for adding wide borders using a coordinating print around the central snowflake; however, for a wedding quilt I wanted something a little more special. 

In my sketchbook I started playing around with a border to frame the center snowflake. I knew I wanted to go with a crisp red and white border design - something simple, but with visual impact on the four corners. 

Two years ago I made this Gift Wrap pillow using a sweet little pattern by Stephanie {Venus de Hilo}. The star in the pillow is called Sister's Star...and I love how it looks like a bow. It seemed to be the perfect star block to use on the four corners of this quilt.

I planned out 10.5" sister's stars with a 2.5" ribbon framing the center Snow-Kissed Star.

My local quilt shop, The Scrappy Apple, had several yards of a red snowflake print from the In from the Cold fabric line - also by Kate Spain. I used this fabric for the red borders and the binding. 

For this young couple I wanted the quilt to have fresh clean lines, and just a hint of a vintage twist. The quilt top turned out just as I hoped it would :o) It is actually a square quilt - I just could not get high enough above it to take a picture that did not make it look rectangular.

Photo taken between rain showers on a cold, windy day

To quilt it I used the walking foot on my machine and quilted in a large spiral using 1/2" spacing. That was the easiest distance to space the lines because it allowed me to use the side of the walking foot as my guide. Using my Janome sewing machine it probably took about 12-15 hours spaced over several days to get the quilting done. Here is a close-up to show the spiral quilting:

I lightly traced around a circular jar lid to get the spiral started

For the backing I found a wonderfully soft, apple-green argyle flannel from Connecting Threads. The apple-green is a great match for the fabrics on the front of the quilt. I was hoping flannel would make the quilt cuddle-worthy and it did not disappoint. The vintage Santa label is from a yard of All Occasion Quilt Labels by Northcott. A Pentel black gel fabric pen worked great to write on the label. 

Name of the bride & groom crossed out on the label to protect privacy

The bridal couple live a long way from where I live so my dear friend, M, delivered the quilt to them when her family traveled to the wedding. She sent me this sweet picture of the lovely bride and groom with their Snowflake Among the Stars quilt. I hope it will be a treasured part of their Christmas celebrations for years to come :o)

The sweet bride and groom with their wedding quilt :o)

What a fun quilting journey this was! Wishing these newly weds a grace-filled marriage blessed with many happy years :o)