Day 6: Hanukkah Project Idea ✨

Happy Day 6 of the blog challenge! Today’s prompt is “oldest UFO” but I have none – I tend to do studio purges and pitch projects I will never finish (or re-purpose them). Instead, here is last year’s post re a very fun quilt for this week (Hanukkah begins Thursday night!) featuring a favorite fabric collection and a terrific way to use Procreate!

Earlier this year, I had the tremendous pleasure of working on the new fabric launch of the “Horizon” collection by the painter Grant Haffner. His work is incredible https://www.granthaffner.com …and so are the fabrics https://windhamfabrics.com/php/fabricshop/fabricshop.php?a=sc&Category=1246 in what I hope will be the first of many from this talented artist!

As the holiday season approached, I stared at the blue and yellow fabrics (“Twilight” and “Sunrise”) and thought, hmm, I spy a Hanukkah quilt. This project was also a very fun example of how Procreate can make you productive no matter where you are…while I waited for my dentist, I imported a photo of the blue fabric into the app and pasted twice so that the entire background was as I wanted:

Next, I considered which fabric I would use for the candles. The many-hued “Dusk” would be perfect, as I could cut 8 strips and each could vary. I added a photo of a slice of this fabric, then added 7 more. Next, the “helper” candle…using the very-light grey “First Light” fabric, I added a ‘candle’ that would appear nearly white.

Now for flames…this is the fun part! Again, I imported a photo of the yellow fabric. Then, using the free form cutting tool, I sketched a flame and dragged it over to the top of each candle. While this is all wildly approximate, it gave me a good feeling for how well the idea would work when I got home to my studio :)…love Procreate!

Once home, I Mistyfused a rectangle of this lovely blue fabric to batting and backing, then began to slice candles (cutting the top of each at a curving angle as if melting a bit) and cut free form flames. Note, if you are not familiar with Mistyfuse, run, do not walk, to the website and order some to try! https://www.mistyfuse.com

The menorah was free cut from a dark variegated fabric that Grant calls “Nightfall” – it is gorgeous. One large piece plus a little ‘candle holder’ bit for the helper candle ;).

All fused and ready to stitch with the perfect shades of my favorite Aurifil thread:

I used very simple quilting, heavily outlining the candles and menorah, then trimming any fray and removing any loose threads. (Incidentally, Heidi Proffetty’s tweezers are the BEST for fusible appliqué! https://www.heidiproffetty.com/product-page/heidi-proffetty-s-precision-tweezers ). For the base, I couldn’t resist adding a bit of a wood finish with my stitching, and I added a bit of echo quilting within each flame. The background was free motion quilted, following the paint strokes of Grant’s design.

Favorite finish: zigzag with the 2a foot, then a second round of stitching adding piping in the background color, and a few tiny stitches through the intersection of the piping ends to secure before trimming:

The dimensions of my piece are: finished size, 15” x 11”…candles, 3/4” wide each. If you decide to make a larger piece, play with a larger “candle” to decide the best scale. Here’s to a light-filled holiday season for you!