Tuesday, April 05, 2011

Go! Butterflies and Dragonflies

Today I am doing a little mini tutorial on the Accuquilt Go! Critters die.  I absolutely love this die since it is sooo cute!  When I did my Go! Butterfly Garden quilt I really liked how the bodies and the wings were different colours on the butterflies and dragon flies.  What I didn't like was I was going to have to hand cut those wings off to get a body and how I would have to try and shape it myself.

Then I had an ah ha moment!  I could use my die!

First apply your favorite fusible webbing to the back of a smaller piece of fabric that will cover only the body of the dragon fly and a contrasting fabric over the who are of the wings of the butterfly.  If you're doing a dragon-fly you can layer fabric over top of your body piece.

Cover this with your mat and run it through your cutter.

You'll have something that looks a little like this.  I know the body isn't shapely yet but here it comes.

Turn the body piece around so that the head is at the tail and the tail at the head.

Make sure that you line it up properly so that the edges of the head and tail are right on the edges of the die.  It is so much easier to do this if you have outlined your dies with your silver Sharpie.

Here's what it looks like after I have run it through the cutter.  See how it has shaped the rest of the body for you?  With absolutely no hand cutting you now have a very attractive looking  body for your butterflies and dragonflies!

Peel the fusible webbing off the back of the body and adhere it to the wings. Voila!  you now have a very shapely body for your dragonflies and butterflies.  How fast and easy was that?  

If you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them here and I will do my best to answer them for you!  And, if you liked this little mini-tute I hope that you will click follow so that you can find me easier.

Happy Quilting!

4 comments:

Four dogs and one quilter said...

Great demo, will save me lots of time. I was wondering how to do it without cutting out each shape by hand.

SewCalGal said...

Great tutorial. Love your tip on the dragonfly too!

SewCalGal
www.sewcalgal.blogspot.com

susan said...

Thanks for posting this demo. When you are cutting strips how do you place the fabric so you know your strips are on the straight of grain and if you do more layers that they all will be straight. If I need for example a 36" border piece.

Anonymous said...

love to winn! hope so!

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