Welcome to Week 1 of the Star Adventure SAL! This first week we will be chatting about the your fabric pull and different color palettes. The Star Adventure Quilt can be made in two different design paths - Adventurous or Alternating. We will discuss the different ways you can assemble your stars and I will provide mock ups for inspiration! Next week, we will be cutting our fabric and mixing and matching our blocks!
BASIC INFORMATION
Be sure you have purchased the Star Adventure Quilt Pattern - PDF or Printed Pattern (USA only)
We will be making two different Star Adventure Quilts - one Medium size that finishes at 55" x 69" and one Large Throw size that finishes at 69" x 83".
The SAL will be hosted on Instagram, be sure your account is public so myself and everyone else can see your progress on the #staradventuresal hashtag.
POST TO INSTAGRAM
Week 1: Introduce yourself and post a photo of your fabric pull and/or your coloring page if you haven't finalized your fabric yet. Be sure to use the #staradventuresal hashtag to be entered into this week's giveaway.
You must post by Thursday September 28th at 11:59pm PST to be entered into the Week 1 giveaway. Each week starts fresh on Fridays and the previous weeks post won't count for the next week's prize.
The weekly prizes will include a custom 12 piece FQ bundle curated by Meghan, Ponderosa Thread Gloss kindly provided by Paige Anderson, and one other notion gifted by Then Came June! You will be contacted when you win and then you get to let me know the color palette you are interested in - all blues, neutrals, rainbow, etc. And I will take your idea and build you a bundle! You get to also tell me if you want all solids, all prints or a mix. I can't wait to specially curate a new bundle each week! And yes, this is open to International participants.
A CLOSER LOOK AT THE STAR ADVENTURE QUILT
In the pattern, I discuss the different ways you can make the Star Adventure Quilt; either creating an Adventurous Assembly or Alternating Assembly design. Regardless of which design path you take, the quilt is essentially divided into three different sections - Stars, Star Backgrounds and Sashing. The Star Adventure Quilt uses Half Square Triangles, not flying geese. I chose HST because they are more beginner friendly AND they are more versatile within a quilt design.
For the two samples we will be making, we are highlighting the Adventurous Assembly while using FQs for both the Stars and Star Backgrounds. The sashing in one is going to be made from yardage and the sashing for the other sample will be made from the FQs, meaning it will be scrappy.
Now, once you have decided which path you are taking and what material cuts you'd like to use, then you can decide on Star Styles. For the Adventurous Assembly design, you can choose from three different Star Styles.
The Solid Stars showcases only two fabrics in a single block. The Mixed Up Stars showcases three fabrics in a single block. The Scrappy Stars will be made from multiple different fabrics in a single block. The Scrappy Stars can only be made when one set of fabric (Star or Star Background) is made from yardage OR you go full scrappy and you mix up every single fabric within the Star and the Background Fabric. Here is a diagram below to explain the Scrappy Star options:
ALTERNATING ASSEMBLY MOCK UPS
The Alternating Assembly design path showcases high contrast, choosing material cuts based on the ability to group them into Dark and Light fabrics. This is a fun bold look that does follow specific guidelines! The Star Style that works best with this design option is the Solid Star. You can choose the Mixed Up Star if one of your sets uses a material cut other than yardage.
ADVENTUROUS ASSEMBLY MOCK UPS
The Adventurous Assembly gives you the most variety and choice! First pick your material cuts you want to use: F8s, FQs, 1/4 yard or Yardage for both the Stars and the Star Backgrounds. Then you get to pick your Star Style and which type of sashing you want - scrappy (use FQs) or yardage!
STAR ADVENTURE CURATING FABRIC TIPS
This pattern is so versatile and makes playing with color super fun. You can go monochromatic, you can go ombre, or you can highlight a few color families at a time. It is endless fun! I will recommend a few guidelines to make the curation of your quilt palette stress free.
MONOCHROMATIC - pick one color family you love and work only within that! You could use yardage or pick F8, FQ or 1/4 yards for one set - Star or Star Backgrounds. An example would be using blues. The mock up below shows the Star Backgrounds and Sashing in FQs in a variety of blues and then the Stars are a RSS Speckled Confetti print.
OMBRE - Pick a palette of fabric that has a beautiful gradient in it. Then you could showcase the ombre effect within the quilt top. This will work for either Stars or Backgrounds or both. Here is a mock up showing a beautiful soft to bold gradient in the Stars with a solid Star Background + Sashing.
A FEW COLOR FAMILIES AT A TIME
Generally, I love to highlight a few color families at a time. I love adding a little depth to each one and then see how they all interact together. Below shows roughly three color families - blues, peaches/pinks, yellows. Now within each family, there is depth - a light blue, to gray blue to deep blue. Same goes for yellows - light yellow, school bus yellow to gold. By highlighting 3 families, you get a lot of variety and playfulness without it feeling overwhelming. I did use a solid yardage for the Star Background which helps ground the Star colors. I did a contrast sashing which adds a fun "frame" to the stars.
This second mock up shows the Stars as all a soft neutral cream color and the Star Backgrounds showing four different color families - yellows, minty greens, peaches and greys. Adding the pop of black sashing is what makes the bold statement in this quilt top.
If you'd like to play with colors within EACH set - Stars and Star Backgrounds - do it! I would suggest that you make the two sets clearly different from each other so the contrast in the quilt makes sense. IE: Stars are blues and greens and Star Backgrounds are yellows and peaches.
DIRECTIONAL + LARGE SCALE PRINTS
DIRECTIONAL FABRIC: If having directional prints all face the same direction is very important to you, DO NOT use directional prints in this quilt. I personally don't mind when it is a basic or geometric print - angular or stripes. I think it's kinda fun and adds to the variety in the top to have stripes go opposite directions randomly. But, if it were a cute print of people walking and then they end up sideways or upside down, it might bother me. Choice is yours.
Also, you CAN use directional prints in Star Adventure but you will only be able to prioritize ONE in a block. So if you have a block that the Star and the Star Backgrounds both have directional prints, only one of those prints will end up oriented correctly.
LARGE SCALE PRINTS: Large Scale prints will work lovely in the Star Fabrics themselves, the star points will be more cut up but the center star is a nice size to highlight a large scale print repeat.
WHAT WE ARE MAKING
For the first time ever, we are making TWO different Star Adventure Quilts during the SAL!
We are going to be making a Medium Throw with FQs for Stars and FQs for Star Backgrounds and then using the Background Fabrics for scrappy sashing as well. We are using our Fall Adventure Joint 20 piece FQ bundle.
Here are some mock ups of different ways this exact bundle could be made:
We are using the 15 FQs in pinks and yellows as the stars and created using Mixed Stars. Then the 15 FQs in blues will be the Star Backgrounds and we are using Kona Roasted Pecan as our contrast sashing.
Here are some mock ups showing different ways you can use the 30 piece FQ bundle.
We have a great selection of FQ bundles to be used to make a Star Adventure Quilt!
STAR ADVENTURE BLOGPOSTS
We have SIX different blogposts up about the different Star Adventure Quilt samples we've made. Browse through and read those to get inspired to make your own!
