O' Holy Night Table Runner with Amy Latta

Hi friends and merry Christmas in July. I'm Amy from Amy Lada Creations and today I want to share with you a very special and festive table runner that I made using the Oh Holy Night template set from Missouri Star Quilt Company. Christmas is my favorite time of year, so I'm ready to celebrate it all year round. Plus, summer is the perfect time to get started on your Christmas projects. Whether you want to use them for your own personal decor, like I'm going to use this runner, or you're making them as gifts, it's great to get a head start so that you're not caught up in the holiday rush. Today, I wanted to walk you through a couple of tricks and tips for how I created this, especially if you're unfamiliar with using applique. Templates are a really great way to add all kinds of personality and detail to your quilting projects. I have lots of different sets for all the seasons and I love this nativity set because it allows me to create things that remind me of the real reason for the season. So to use a template set and do the applique technique, all you're going to do is choose the shapes and silhouettes that you want to use and then you're going to be tracing them onto fabric that has a fusible adhesive backing. So first let's talk about these shapes that we get to choose from. This kit has the holy family. You've got Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. You have animals like the camel, the sheep, and then you also have, it's labeled as a magi, but an extra person, uh, who I also used as a shepherd. I cut out two of them, and then I reused Joseph for the three kings. And then I used the same figure for my shepherd. I also decided to use the angel figure and her little trumpet. I did one angel on each side. So, basically what I did was I took five white 10-in blocks and on each one I created a scene. So, first what you do is you take so light or another fusible adhesive and iron it onto the back of the fabric that you want for your shapes. I decided to use a really sweet navy blue tone on tone so that it looked like silhouettes but they weren't really harsh black. Then what I did was once I had the adhesive on the back of the fabric, I traced the templates that I wanted to use and then I cut them out. I peeled off the adhesive backing and then put them on my white squares and iron them to hold them in place. That's all there is to doing applique. Then if you like, you can go back and either hand sew or machine stitch around the edges of your applique just to keep it from fraying or peeling. Um, or you can leave it as is, like I did on my runner. Once I had my sort of storybook panels, that's what I think of them as, I used strips of fabric in between to join them together. And then I did a sweet little patchwork border using 2 and 1/2 in squares all the way around. I quilted it just doing X's through those 2 and 1/2 in squares and some straight line stitching here on the connecting pieces. really simple, easy to do on your domestic sewing machine. And finally, I added a binding. This was so much fun to make. I loved using the templates to create an entire nativity scene that tells the story of Christmas, and it gets to live on my table all season long. I can't wait for Christmas to come around so that I can put this to use. I hope that you'll check out the Oh Holy Night template builder set and see what you can create. Merry Christmas in July.