Brighten up your Christmas décor with this Lighted Reindeer Mini Quilt. The center block is appliqued, embroidered and quilted in the hoop. The borders and sashing are added at your sewing machine.
The pocket is optional on this mini quilt as the battery case and 2 size C batteries pooch out the center of the quilt when it is in the frame. Directions are given to make a pocket to fit this larger battery pack. If you are using a different brand that has a ½” thick AA size battery pack follow the instructions on the Twinkling Lights Christmas Tree Mini Quilt, or if desired, there is enough string on the described Deco Lights teeny bulb® to just set the case behind the mini quilt frame. Make your decision before you bind the project.
Step 1:
Cut 2 10” x 9” rectangles of the snowflake fabric as the front and back pieces Cut 1 10” x 9” rectangle of Battilizer® or low loft batting Cut 1 3” x 3” square of the border fabric for the scarf applique Cut 1 4” x 4” square of the tan fabric for the face Cut 1 4” x 7” rectangle of the tan fabric for the body Cut a 3” x 3” square, a 4” x 4” square and a 4” x 7” rectangle of Heat N Bond Lite® Cut no show stabilizer the size need to fit your embroidery hoop. Tautly hoop the stabilizer.
Step 2:
Spray with Magic Sizing and iron the body, face and scarf applique fabrics. Fuse the Heat N Bond Lite® to the applique fabrics following the manufacturer’s instructions.
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Step 3:
Tautly hoop no show stabilizer in your embroidery hoop. If your large hoop has a tendency to be loose along the long side, wrap the inner hoop with self-adhesive bandage. Run color stop (CS) 1 in a neutral thread as a placement line.
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Step 4:
Spray adhesive on the back of the front fabric. Run CS 2 to tack down the fabric with water soluble thread.
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Step 5:
Run CS 3 in black to stitch the light string and CS 4 in Crème for the antlers.
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Step 6:
Run CS 5 as a placement line for the reindeer body in Lt Brown Sugar
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Step 7:
Spray adhesive on the body applique fabric and position over the placement lines. Run CS 6 in Lt Brown Sugar to tack down the applique.
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Step 8:
Remove the hoop from the machine, do not unhoop, and place it on a flat surface so as not to loosen the stabilizer. Trim the applique right up next to the tack down lines. Iron the body with an applique iron to fuse it to the background fabric.
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Step 9:
Run CS 7 in Lt Brown Sugar and CS 8 in Dark Chocolate to stitch the detail on the body.
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Step 10:
Run CS 9 in a color to match your scarf fabric as a placement line.
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Step 11:
Spray adhesive on your scarf fabric and position over the placement line and tack down with CS 10. Trim the scarf and iron the applique down as we did the body in Step 8.
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Step 12:
Run CS 11 in Fir to border a portion of the scarf, then we need to stitch CS 12 in Lt Brown Sugar to get the proper perspective on the neck, stitch CS 13 in Fir to complete the border on the scarf.
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Step 13:
Switch back to Lt Brown Sugar to run CS 14, CS 15 and CS 16 to applique the head as in Steps 6, 7 and 8.
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Step 14:
While you have the hoop off of the machine to trim and iron the head applique, turn the hoop over. The two lower sections of satin stitch on the scarf will now be turned into fringe. Use a seam ripper or small sharp scissors to slice the bobbin thread on the two circled sections of satin stitch.
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Step 15:
From the front of the hoop carefully lift the fringe up to the top of the fabric.
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Step 16:
Follow the color chart through CS 20 to complete the details on the reindeer.
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Step 17:
Remove the hoop from the machine, do not unhoop, and place the hoop face down on a flat surface. Spray adhesive on the Battilizer® and position over the back of the embroidery aligning with front fabric block. Spray adhesive on the wrong side of the back fabric and place over the Battilizer®.
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Step 18:
Return the hoop to the machine, run CS 21 in water soluble thread to tack down the back fabrics. Run CS 22 in white to quilt the block and CS 23 in white to embroidery the circles where the lights will be inserted.
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Step 19:
We will now trim all sides of the block to ¼” from the water soluble tack down lines. Your tack down lines may not line up exactly due to the pull of the embroidery. Place your ruler’s ¼” mark on the outside water soluble line to make your trims.
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Step 20:
Use small scissors that are sharp to the tip to cut an X through all layers on all 20 embroidered circles
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Step 21:
Cut 4 2” x 10” strips of border fabric Cut 4 2” x 12” strips of border fabric Cut 2 2” x 10” strips of Battilizer® Cut 2 2” x 12” strips of Battilizer® With spray adhesive make a quilt sandwich of these strips by spraying the wrong side of fabric with the adhesive and placing a Battilizer® on top, then spraying and placing the second corresponding fabric strip on top on top of the Battilizer®. You will have two 10” borders and two 12” borders.
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Step 22:
From the green fabric cut 2 1” strips and 2 2” strips for the sashing; cut 2 2 ¼” strips for the binding
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Step 23:
Spray Magic Sizing or spray starch on your sashing strips and iron; fold the 2” strips lengthwise and press in half.
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Step 24:
Clip a 1” strip of sashing face down to the back of one side edge of the quilted block. Have the edges of the sashing strip extend approximately ½” over each end of the block.
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Step 25:
At the same time clip the raw edges of the folded 2” sashing strip to the front of the quilt block having the ends exceed the length of the side approximately ½”.
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Step 26:
Stitch the two sashing strips to the quilt block with an accurate ¼” seam. Note stitching through all these layers is easier with a 3mm stitch length and a ¼” presser foot.
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Step 27:
Press the 1” strip only out away from the block.
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Step 28:
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Clip a 10” border sandwich to the right side of the 1” strip extending the ends of the border strip approximately ½” over the ends of the center block.
Step 29:
Stitch the border to the 1” sashing with an accurate ¼” seam.
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Step 30:
When you open out the attached border the seam allowances should butt up to each other with gaps or overlaps.
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Step 31:
Press the top sashing over the seam allowances and edge stitch the sashing to close.
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Step 32:
Repeat Steps 24 through 31 to attach the border to the other long edge of the center block then trim the excess sashing and border from the top and bottom of the center block.
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Step 33:
Repeat Steps 24 through 31 to attach the borders to the top and bottom of the quilt block.
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Step 34:
This is the battery pack that is mentioned in the preface to this article. Read it above the instructions and decide if you want to add this pocket.
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Step 35:
Cut a piece of fabric 4 ½” tall and 5 ½” wide. Zigzag down the two sides to clean finish the sides. Make a casing for the elastic by folding down the top edge ¼” and press, then fold down ½” and press. Stitch the lower edge of the folded casing to the pocket. With a safety pin feed 4” of elastic through the casing. Hold the tail end in place with a craft clip.
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Step 36:
Slightly gather the bottom edge of the pocket with a long machine stitch.
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Step 37:
Center the pocket at the bottom center of the quilt; turn under the side edges ¼” and slip stitch the pocket sides to the quilt by hand.
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Step 38:
Bind the quilt as desired catching the bottom edge of the pocket in the binding.
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Step 39:
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After you put the bind on search around the edges of your quilt block for any water soluble thread tack down stitches that were not covered by the sashing.
Step 40:
Simply wet the corner of a cloth or sponge and rub along the visible water soluble thread, in a few minutes the thread will disappear. Be sure to look at the back at the quilt to see if the corresponding bobbin thread is also visible, you can then pull out and trim off that bobbin thread.
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Step 41:
Add a hanging sleeve ½” below the top edge of the quilt. If you do not know how to make a hanging sleeve see our article “Attaching a Hanging Sleeve to a Mini Quilt” https://www.embroiderydesigns.com/emb_learning/project/1463/attaching-a-hanging-sleeve-to-a-mini-quilt
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Step 42:
Insert the lights through the 20 holes in the mini quilt.
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Step 43:
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Feed the hanging sleeve onto the split rod of the quilt frame. Congratulations your Lighted Reindeer Mini Quilt is complete!
Award winning Digitizer, Embroidery Educator, Author and a Consultant to the Industry, Pat Williams has 30 years of experience in the embroidery industry. Pat has won multiple awards for her digitizing expertise including the 2007 Impressions Awards Grand Championship, Best of Show as well as the 1st and 2nd Place Awards. Pat’s love of digitizing has afforded her the opportunity to write numerous articles for Impressions magazine in the United States and Images Magazine in Europe. In 2001 Pat was named “Embroidery Educator of the Year.” For many years Pat taught digitizing seminars at the ISS Shows in Long Beach, CA and for Compucon software. She now resides in Tucson, AZ.
