Apr 29 11
Appli-K-Kutz Fabric Cutting Dies are Now Available!!
If you’ve been reading my blog, then you know that my quilting life took an exciting twist last fall when I discovered how quickly and easily I could cut intricate applique shapes using my Sizzix machine. I can’t put into words just how much fun I’ve had playing with my machine and the fact that I can do all this work so quickly and easily is icing on the cake! I am very excited to tell you that we are now offering our own line of fabric cutting dies, called “Appli-K-Kutz” dies. These are designed for use in fusible applique and raw edge wool applique. Here’s a preview of our initial die offering:
This is my personal favorite, the “Small Feather die.” It’s my favorite because this C-shaped feather can be arranged in all kinds of neat designs. You saw it above in the first quilt block and here is another example:
It also works beautifully to create feathered wreaths, as in the Night & Day quilt below:
…and these small feathers “nest” well together to create border designs. Here’s a short border example:
…and here you can see the border in action, in the “Amish Feathered Wreath” Quilt. (This pattern will also be available in the next couple of weeks):
Another great block made with these small feathers is seen in the Feather Reflections Quilt:
…and they also nest well together in circles:
These are just a few examples of some of the many ways to use that feather. Now let’s look at the Large Feather Die:
This S-shaped curve feather is also versatile. It nests well to create intricate border designs:
…and it works well to create ornate corner designs (shown here coupled with the “small straight feather” die):
It is also the basis for the complex-appearing quilt blocks featured in the “Dancing Feather Quilt” below (the pattern for this quilt will be available in the next couple of weeks):
That quilt blows me away because it looks complex, but since the machine cuts all those feathers for you, it’s a quickie to put together! This isn’t all you can do with the large feather die, but I’ve got to move on to some other dies or I’ll never finish writing this post! Here’s another one called the “Plume Family” Die:
This die is different from standard “plume” dies already on the market. It features 2 sizes of bi-lobed plumes, a one-sided short feather, and 2 sizes of small plumes and it allows you to create really ornate feathered wreaths like this one:
Isn’t that more of a girly-girl feathered wreath?! The nice part is you can make these wreaths in all kinds of sizes, just by altering the radius of the “spine circle” from which you’ll flow your plumes. If you wanted to crank up that wreath complexity another notch, you can use the small teardrop shapes inside the plumes like this:
You also use this die to make the internal plumes in the complex feathered wreaths that use the small feather die:
In the above photo, the smaller of the bi-lobed plumes was used for the internal wreath plumes, but know that you can also use the larger bi-lobed plume or the one-sided feather shape on that die for the internal plumes. (You’ll just need to reduce the number of plumes on the inside of the wreath for those.) Could you also throw in some of those small teardrop plumes in a contrasting color for a more interesting inner wreath? You bet you can! Any of the 3 larger shapes on this die make nice pinwheel blocks as well:
And here’s another feather die. This one is called the “Straight Feather, Small:”
This die can be used for basic kinds of quilt blocks:
…and you can also couple it with other shapes, like:
…or with one of the curved feather die shapes to create complex corner designs:
Now let’s move to some non-feather die designs. This first one is called “Poppies:”
You’re probably wondering what those 2 small shapes are for. Once the flowers are cut, the centers have a “negative space.” They’ll look cool when placed directly onto a background (as they’ll take on the color/pattern of the background fabric), but you can also use those small shapes to cut pieces that fill in those negative spaces with whatever color/pattern you wish. See below:
…and here they have been fused to the reverse side of the poppies:
(Those background shapes are cut just a tad larger than the negative spaces.) Now these poppy shapes can be used anyplace you’d like to use a flower. Here’s one block example:
…and here’s a companion block:
These are just a couple of examples of how you could use the poppy shapes, but anywhere that you could use a flower…think poppies! Next up is a really fun die that we call “Bird, Simple or Fancy:”
You can spend hours coming up with different combinations of design elements to create all kinds of birds, from basic birds to super-fancy birds! Here’s just a taste of ideas to whet your appetite:
That bird is pretty “white bread” if you ask me!Let’s start dressing him up, little by little:
That was pretty easy…all we did was add a second set of tail feathers and use that same set of feathers for a headdress! Now let’s crank it up a notch again:
Whoa!! Don’t you just love that tail swirl?!! That tail swirl can be used in other ways as well:
…all you need to do is snip of part of that swirl and it also makes a great headdress! Did you notice the tail feathers on that last bird? I substituted the one sided feather from the “Plume Family” die, just to show you that you can mix and match lots of these dies together. Now we can take this mixture even further by adding some of those teardrop plumes from the “Plume Family” die into the tail feathers:
…and for the fanciest bird of all, we mix the bird die with the small feather die and voila, we have our over-the-top fancy bird:
Wow! Now every die I’ve told you about so far is compatible with the Sizzix Big Shot machine. Now let me tell you about 2 more dies that are larger and require either the Sizzix Big Shot Pro or the Accuquilt Studio machines. First up is the “Straight Feather, Large” die:
This die is similar to the “Straight Feather, Small” die, but it’s bigger so it packs more punch! It can be used easily to create beautiful block designs like this one:
…and you can also use it to create beautiful flower blocks since it works well as a stylized stem design like this one:
And the last die I want to let you know about is the “8 1/2 inch feathered wreath’ die:
This die is for when you’re in a real hurry to create a wreath fast, because you can literally have a wreath ready to fuse in just a few cranks of your handle:
And if you’re in a mood to dress up that wreath just a little bit, you could throw in those small plume shapes from the “Plume Family die:
…or you could take that wreath over the top by adding those internal plumes to both the inner and outer rings of the wreath:
This wreath works really well in the “Feathers Jubilee” Quilt:
Here, those wreaths are coupled with “feather quartet” blocks created with the small straight feather die and this pattern will be available in the next couple of weeks.
Whew…this has been a long post but I wanted to give you some ideas and inspiration about some ways to use these applique dies. I’ve had a blast working with them for the last few months and I hope you do as well!
Wow!
Fabulous! I’ve been waiting for stencils like these. I absolutely love the bird and poppies.
Absolutely spectacular. I love this entire set. The plumes, the bird, the swirls. Excellent. Can’t wait to make MANY quilts with them.
SewCalGal
http://www.sewcalgal.blogspot.com
not sure why, but when I try to leave a comment on your blog I get an error message that says I’m attempting to leave a “duplicate” comment, even if it is my first comment.
SewCalGal
http://www.sewcalgal.blogspot.com
Ooops. Please ignore comment #4.
Wow!!!!
My favourite is the Amish one but they are all lovely and each and every one has potential to do so much with them.
Do you need a machine to use the dies?
So, this is what you’ve been working on! Congrats on the product launch. You’ve done well. It’s funny, as I was reading I started thinking… how did she do that! A little more reading… ah ha! She’s had the dies made!
Looks great!
-Alice
Oh wow, I always look eagerly to any designs you so generously share.
Wow, those are lovely.. I especially like the plume family, and the curvy large feather.. Any chance of being able to use the dies in an accuquilt Go cutter??