November Leaves and Acorns Completed

This post continues my work on the November banner from the Pieceful Patchwork Banner for November from Shabby Fabrics that I assembled in my previous post dated 10/31/26. The "Quilt as Desired" phrase used to strike fear in me, but not so much now. I break down these wall hangings into sections and try something different in each area. I still struggle with what how to treat the empty space in the background when left to my own freeform attempts. This post is about FMQ, labeling, binding, and completion of the September banner.

FMQ
For the acorns I echo quilting ¼" away from the central sawtooth star. Then I echoed again but this time ½" from the first echo. I wanted to see if the variation would lend some extra interest and I liked the effect. I echoed a third time, this time ¼" away from the second echo. The result gives the illusion of a larger star around the central sawtooth. A consistent, repetitive  ¼" spacing would have given texture but this alternating spacing surprised me a bit and I will try this approach again. For the cupule (cap of the acorn) I used a clamshell template to appear like shingles on a roof. I FMQ'd a dense ¼" diagonal grid on the plaid stem. A decision on the background will wait until I have FMQ'd the leaves.

For the leaves, I repeated my newly tried technique of alternately-spaced echoing, ¼ ", ½ ", ¼" and three rounds of echoing. Then I was stumped as to what to with the center of the leaf. My solution was to audition additional rounds of echoing to fill in the center to see what would happen. Satisfied it would solve my what-to-do-in-the-center problem, I committed to additional rounds of non-uniformly spaced echoing. The next photo shows only the the first three echoes, not the proposed fourth and fifth echoes.

I usually struggle with what to FMQ in the background. I am terrible at meandering and pebbles though I like the effect of both. It seems I need more structure rather than a blank space in which to do whatever my little heart desires. Logic would dictate that I practice meandering and pebbles more, but alas, I chickened out once again. 

Here is a completed leaf with background quilted. The center was filled nicely enough with a fourth echo and a fifth was not needed. This photo shows I added free-form scallops around the stem, further filling in the negative space. I free-form sewed arcs around the edges and the perimeter of the leaves. Those arcs seemed to fill the negative space well enough I did not need to battle pebbles or meandering.  I liked it well enough I put those arcs on the acorn background as well. They seemed to form pillows which softened the background.

FMQ in the wide, leaf-print outer border was half circles. The inner thinner olive border seemed narrow enough to not need quilting but I mirrored the half circles in the outer border with shallow arcs in the inner border. For the sashing that runs horizontal and vertical in the banner, I added small scallops on two edges.

 

These are the rulers I used for the November banner: 

• the 3" size of the HQ clamshell for the outer border
• the top portion of the 4" HQ clamshell for the inner border
• the 2" size of the HQ clamshell for the acorn top
• the mini scallop ruler for the vertical and horizontal sashing edges and leaf stem
• the Angela Walters Slim for all straight lines

Labels
While deciding how to quilt the background, I took a break to make my labels in hopes that inspiration would arrive quietly in my subconscious (which it did). My grosgrain labels were burgundy thread on peach grosgrain ribbon and read LEAVES_AND_ACORNS and DIC_NOV_2026. As is my tradition for these banners, the NOV stands for the theme month and not my month of completion. Here are the labels before attachment to the quilt corners. I attach the labels to the quilt before binding so their raw edges are covered.

Binding
I leave ¼" extra batting around the edges when binding with folded-in-half 2½" wide strips. The next photo shows that extra margin. Also, at an angle, the quilting shows up better. I cut out my binding at the same time I initially I cut out the components. I join the strips but do not press in half lengthwise. I think it goes on a bit more smoothly this way, and the effort to fold it over at time of application is no harder or time-consuming than pressing that long length. The second photo shows the corners of the bound quilt where the labels are attached, raw edges of the grosgrain ribbon tucked under the binding.

Completed Banner

The next two photos are of the front and back of the completed banner for November. Leaves and Acorns  measures 31" x 31" like the other monthly banners.

All I have left to make are the banners for December and February. Here are the links for the other banners I have completed from this series from Shabby Fabrics.

• JAN    Snowmen and Snowflakes (2/10/26)
• MAR  Shamrocks and Irish Chains (4/6/26)
• APR   Bunnies and Carrots (3/6/26)
• MAY   Roses and Pansies (9/11/25)
• JUN   Strawberries (9/6/25)
• JUL    Flags and Pinwheels (6/24/26)
• AUG   Bees and Sunflowers (9/21/25)
• SEP    Log Cabins and Schoolhouses  (8/5/26)
• OCT    Flying Geese and Pumpkins (8/26/26)
• NOV   Leaves and Acorns (this post 11/5/26)

My stash still holds two more banners to assemble. I bought the kit for December, but for February I bought the pattern only and will be left to my own devices for the fabric choices. My goal is to finish the December banner by Christmas in 2026 and the February banner by Valentine's Day in 2027.

November Leaves and Acorns

The Pieceful Patchwork kit for November by Shabby Fabrics has leaves and acorns, all in burgundy, brown, and golden fall tones. The rich colors seduced me into buying this kit. Those sawtooth star acorns were just so darn cute, I could not leave them behind.

Cutting
I cut all the fabrics per the instructions labeling, each piece with a color-coded letter for the intended block, pink for Leaf or black for Acorn. I used my Pink Melamine Tray, Alphabitties and Clover Wonder Clips to stay organized. To the right of the tray are the the long strips for sashing and borders. Also on the tray are the two laser-cut, pre-fused brown strips for the stems of the leaves. The backing and binding fabrics are not in the photo but they did come in the kit.

Leaves
I tackled the leaves first, sewing two at a time, since they are identical. Variety comes with their position and orientation in the finished banner. One thing I like about these kits is that a preferred pressing direction is given at each step and the plan is generally pretty optimized to avoid clumps of bulk at seam intersections. These are my two leaves. Not part of the pattern, I used the triangles removed from the flip corners at each leaf point to make four pinwheels.

Acorns

I learned that the top hat of an acorn is called a cupule and is made up of fused leaves. I made the cupules of the two acorns first. A cupule is defined as 

a small, cup-shaped structure found in botany, archaeology, and entomology. For an acorn cap a cupule refers to the cup-shaped cluster of hardened, fused bracts (modified leaves) at the base of an acorn in oak trees (Quercus) and related families. It is also known as an acorn cup.

The acorns each have a saw tooth star at the center. The points of the star are made with two squares and an elongated rectangle, a slight deviation from classic flying geese. This method gives more area around the star without additional seams.

Here is a completed acorn. I was able to get one pinwheel from the cut corners of the base of the two acorns, but it was smaller than pinwheels from the leaves. Corners cut off from the cupules of the two acorns yielded only one pinwheel, and the effort to get it was questionable due to its small size. Pinwheels from cut-off corners of the star points were marginally too small to be worth the effort. Shown is the largest pinwheel from the leaves (one of a yield of 4) and two small pinwheels, one of each size, from the acorns. Total yield of pinwheels was six.

Adding Sashing and Borders
The sashing is an olive green and the corner stone is of the same brown metallic plaid as the acorn stems. This fabric is a stunner. It was also used in a larger quantity as the sunflowers' centers in the Pieceful Patchwork August banner I made. Here is the November banner with sashing and borders attached. Now it needs to be sandwiched and FMQ'd. Then I will attach the labels and binding.

Make It Merry Wreath Completion

In my previous post on 10/20/26 I cited my remaining tasks. They included: 1) fill in FMQ, 2) decide a name, 3) make labels, 4) bind the quilt, and 5) take photos. This post covers my addressing those completion tasks.

Fill-in FMQ 

A secondary pattern formed beyond the white area in the center of the wreath. It looked like four "arrows" were pointing inward. Their emptiness called out to me. Also just beyond the arrows were four diamonds that also seemed a bit naked. With green thread, I put 1¾" diameter circles in the four arrows and 1" diameter circles in the  four diamonds. Then I stopped inspecting and declared the FMQ finished!

These are the  tools I used for those circles. The one on the left helped me visualize what size circles I wanted. Quilting templates have a built- in ¼" allowance for the foot which can sometimes skew judgment of the desired circle size. I used this "green relic" in my engineering training days for drawing on a drafting board (not with a computer) and wondered if they still make these things. Yep. I found The Hole Thing by Creative grids on Shabby Fabrics. Now I won't be so paranoid about misplacing my "green relic" from the 1970s. For actually quilting the desired circles, I used the BIG HQ Swiss Cheese Template on the right. It has the unique 1¾" size that other circle templates do not. It is no longer made by Handiquilter. A workaround is to use a different circle size with echo feet. I have shown the echo feet I own. They come in a ⅜-inch interval, a ½-inch interval, and a ¾-inch interval. The ones Handiquilter offers now look different.

With white thread, I completed holly leaves in the half-quilted blocks in the four corners of the wreath. I also noticed that there was a spot between the tails of the red bow that could use a circle, so I added one.

Decide a Name 

Since there are eight previous blog posts referring to this project as Make It Merry, changing the name on it now would be confusing. The assigned kit name, Make It Merry, although quite valid during the construction of the quilt, seemed to be too vague for use as a long term name.  I spent waaaaay too much time trying brainstorming other options. Here were some proposals: 

Briefly considered, but soon rejected, trying to incorporate ring or round in the name

• RING OF JOY
• MERRY RING
• MERRY GO ROUND
• ROUND ROUND GET AROUND (from the Beach Boys song I Get Around )
• FIFTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS (five golden rings reference)

Given serious consideration based on kit name or getting wreath in name

• MADE IT MERRY (past tense since completed)
• MERRY WREATH
• XMAS WREATH
• MERRY XMAS WREATH

The finalists, both based on Christmas carols

• DECK THE WALLS (reference to Deck the Halls)
• O CHRISTMAS WREATH (reference to O Christmas Tree)

I went with O CHRISTMAS WREATH because, "What if the quilt were spread on a couch instead of being hung on a wall?"

Make the Labels

I made my labels with my Pfaff Triptonic 2040 by embroidering them on pale pink grosgrain. I hand-sewed them on the two lower corners of the quilt before applying the binding.

Bind the Quilt

I'd cut and prepped the 2½" red/white candy stripe binding before I completed my FMQ. I folded it in half and pressed along the long, long length... a step I find tedious. Afterward, I read a tip that stated that binding went on more smoothly if not creased in half. I thought that would only be true for bias binding; but for my last quilt, I had tried the not-pressed technique for cross grain binding and it had worked very well. The outer layer can reach a bit farther around than the inner layer, not constrained by a pre-determined crease. Even though the tip was too late for this quilt (and most other quilts I have made in the past), the creased binding cooperated quite well. I sewed it on the back by hand, after wrapping around from the front. I show a closeup of the binding around a corner.

Finished Quilt

Here are photos of the front and back of the completed O Christmas Wreath. It measures 47" by 47". With more professional lighting at an angle, the quilting probably would have shown up better; however, I have provided an abundance of details of the FMQ in previous posts

This is a closeup of the backing fabric. I love the holly leaves and the splash of pink in the berries. I also like that there are two greens, olive and teal. I did use either white or teal for the bobbin thread so as not to risk bobbles on the top if the tension strays. Upper left has teal and lower right has white and it is barely noticeable on the back.

Finally, I present my attempt at an "artfully draped" photo.

O CHRISTMAS WREATH was an engaging, fun project that I thoroughly enjoyed from beginning to end. I eagerly anticipated its arrival in the mail each month, and am pleased to report I did not get behind in its construction. These are the links to the eight previous blog posts about me merrily making my Make It Merry kit. 

• 06/14/25 Make It Merry Month ONE star with nine-patch centers (8)
• 06/21/25 Make It Merry Month TWO  3x3 grid stars and 4x4 grid stars (4+4)
• 08/16/25 Make It Merry Month THREE crosses (6+2)
• 09/01/25 Make It Merry Month FOUR on point four patch in center (6), loops on bow (2)
• 10/24/25 Make It Merry Month FIVE  pluses for center (4), red central diamonds (4)
• 10/27/25 Make It Merry Month SIX ribbon tails (2)
• 10/08/26 Assembly and FMQ quilting in green and red areas
• 10/20/26 More FMQ quilting in white areas 
• 10/27/26 Completion of O CHRISTMAS WREATH(this post) naming, labeling, binding

Make It Merry — More FMQ

Overview
When I last left off working on this quilt, I had FMQ'd all the green areas (post for 10/8/26), leaving the red bow and the cream background areas undecided. I FMQ'd those areas and posted pictures of the results in this post. But I am not quite finished yet. It will still take me one more post before this quilt is completed. I will need to fill in any FMQ bare areas, decide a name, make the labels, bind the quilt, and take photos. These are certainly enough topics for a final post.

Bow
I next FMQ'd the bow. I chose to stay with green thread although I did contemplate using red to match the ribbon color. Red would have provided texture only and camouflage my imperfections. But as I practice my FMQ skills and grow, I need to be brave and use a non-matching thread color, even if it does show up my goofs. I chose parallel stitching lines, narrow at ¼" spacing for the "reverse side" of the ribbon and wider at ½" on the front. Yes there were a few wobbles which were horrendous when I first did them; but some must have readjusted themselves overnight because when I looked at the bow the next morning, they were not so obvious. My hesitancy to self-quilt lessened once I told my self I could always pick out what was hideous. But then a wise quilter once asked me to decide if I wanted to get better at quilting or get better at picking out. That choice would help me apportion my time accordingly.

Borders
Next up was the borders and for those I did decide to change thread color to a cream and quilt a different pattern on each fabric. Circles, a zig-zig, and a grid were my three choices for the three borders.

I have done circles before and, although they are time consuming since a use a ruler, I like the results. Two examples are my Christmas Cars quilt from 2020 and my Quilt by Number quilt from 2022.

Still in place on my HQ Sweet Sixteen, here is the beginning of my FMQing the innermost border with adjacent circles. The circles are 1½" diameter nested between two lines each ¼" in from the edges of the 2" wide border with the tiny cherries print.

The next border to quilt is on a really low volume fabric with subtle stars. I chose a zigzag here since the background is so plain and would benefit from a bit of excitement. Rather than angling the triangle sides at 45°, I spaced the base at 3" to echo the spacing of the 6" blocks and let the angle fall wherever within the 2" wide border. Interior to each resulting triangle I placed a ¾" diameter circle. As I sewed, I chanted to myself, "Angle, Stem, Circle, Stem". 

                                     

This pattern was very time consuming because I had to remove the circle ruler between every triangle in order to do the straight lines for the angle and "stem". I just went slowly, unable to switch to something simpler once I had started. Perhaps a lazy "L" instead of a circle on a stem would have had a similar effect. Also, I could have tried stitching the circle freehand without a ruler but I do not think that would have looked as crisp. Oh well... 20-20 hindsight. I still like the overall look. It took me four sittings to get it all done, but I am pleased I persevered. Here are the Handi Quilter and Angela Walters rulers I used: HQ Mini Circle Template and Slim.

The outermost border I decided to quilt a diagonal grid as printed on the fabric. I auditioned every diagonal (upper option) versus every other diagonal (lower option) but chose the closer spacing. Denser would be twice as much effort but the sparser one looked like something was missing.  I did use a straight ruler to stay between the wiggly lines of the grid. It was actually more efficient since with the straight guidance I did not need to be so carefully slow. 

After stitching the grid in the outermost border, here is how the three borders look. The tiny puffs in that outer border made the labor-intensive denser grid worth it.

Wreath Center
The last section to quilt was the very center of the wreath. Since the center is background to the wreath and not the focal point, I wanted the quilting to be mainly texture. A secondary pattern emerged when I'd quilted the green wreath blocks. It was an X (or a rotated plus sign). I thought echoing that shape might be interesting. When I auditioned echoing though, the shape invaded the central space for texture (left photo). I chose to leave the echoing out and fill the space with four arcs around each square. A secondary pattern of overlapping circles pops out which seems to relate back to the circles in two of the outer borders. I proceeded with this preferred option (right photo). 

The FMQ in the central wreath area is shown in the next photo. I am pleased with the pillowed textured look. However, those four "arrows" in the crotches of the X seem to need something extra. I will switch back to the green thread and fill each in... maybe with an echo, or an isolated snowflake, or a stand alone circle, or perhaps a holly leaf? Stay tuned. The end is in sight!

Here are the previous posts for this Make It Merry wreath quilt

• 06/14/25 Make It Merry Month ONE star with nine-patch centers (8)
• 06/21/25 Make It Merry Month TWO  3x3 grid stars and 4x4 grid stars (4+4)
• 08/16/25 Make It Merry Month THREE crosses (6+2)
• 09/01/25 Make It Merry Month FOUR on point four patch in center (6), loops on bow (2)
• 10/24/25 Make It Merry Month FIVE  pluses for center (4), red central diamonds (4)
• 10/27/25 Make It Merry Month SIX ribbon tails (2)
• 10/08/26 Assembly and FMQ quilting in green and red areas
• 10/20/26 More FMQ (this post) quilting in white areas 

Make It Merry Assembly and FMQ

My goodness. It has been nearly a year since I posted about this quilt. My last post was 10/27/25 where I had completed the sixth month of the blocks and was ready to assembly them all. I'll admit to dragging my feet a bit when it came to assembling those 36 blocks in the center. Would my points meet where I wanted them to? I was nervous for no good reason. I methodically made three columns of six pair each, sewed the pairs into six rows, and then joined all the rows (minus the ribbon ties) into a a central section. Even those eight pesky perimeter blocks with a four patch as a diamond in each center from month FOUR trimmed up square with a bit of ruler magic before joining. This next photo was taken 11/20/25, and then my progress on this quilt came to a screeching halt. 

Apparently I added the border but never blogged about it because now I am deciding the FMQ. I have no photo assembled and with borders despite the fact that the flimsy hung over the railing in my living room for months. I reviewed my past posts to jog my memory and generated a diagram to help me decide how to FMQ the blocks. I knew I did not want to quilt an allover pattern.

• 06/14/25 Make It Merry Month ONE star with nine-patch centers (8)
• 06/21/25 Make It Merry Month TWO  3x3 grid stars and 4x4 grid stars (4+4)
• 08/16/25 Make It Merry Month THREE crosses (6+2)
• 09/01/25 Make It Merry Month FOUR on point four patch in center, (6) loops on bow (2)
• 10/24/25 Make It Merry Month FIVE  pluses for center (4), red central diamonds (4)
• 10/27/25 Make It Merry Month SIX ribbon tails (2)

I draw on clear sheet protectors with whiteboard markers to preview candidates for the FMQ. Month ONE block was the sawtooth star and I decided to echo-quilt the star shape. Echoing on only the inside seemed insufficient, so I also echoed ¼" on the outside as well. I started by FMQing the blocks in the green portion of the wreath with green thread beginning with the ONE star blocks,

A go-to FMQ shape of mine is petals from Angela Walters book. Petals worked with month THREE both singly and double outlined. 

Petals also seem to work with months FIVE (left) and FOUR (right) again with an extra outline of echoing to fill in the shape.

Here are the star on ONE and petal option on FIVE side by side having been FMQ'd.

Looking back at the crosses of the block from month THREE, I decided to try a design of my own — holly leaves in the arms of the X's — and it seemed to work.

I liked the holly experiment so much I planned for it on the block TWOs even they are are basically stars like the month ONE blocks. For the four TWOs at the wreath corners (left), I did one leaf and two half leafs, avoiding the diagonal white half of the block. These were a 4x4 grid. For the four TWOs at the extreme corners of the quilt itself (right), I did three complete leafs, omitting a fourth leaf that would extend into the white corner square. These were a 3x3 grid so I needed to guess more where the points of the holly leafs would fall. In practice I had to leave my cell phone on nearby displaying a photo of my clear auditioning sheet marked with critical dots as a reference.

Here is that holly motif stitched in the eight TWOs: four 4x4-grid TWOs at the wreath corners, and four 3x3-grid TWOs at the exterior corners. 

I pillow stitched inside the two bow loops. I did not agonize at all over this choice.

Now I pause again to make decisions. 

• How should I do the borders?
• Treat them as long lines, not a series of blocks?
• What pattern in the border? 
• Maybe something different in each of the three border fabrics? 
• The outermost fabric lends itself well to a diagonal grid. 
• I could do feathers ignoring the different fabric bands, but feathers seem too formal.
• Perhaps a curved band of holly leaves in lieu of feathers? 
• Should I switch to cream thread so contrasting green does not distract from the wreath?
• What about the ribbon and bow? Should they be in stitched in red?
• Perhaps just parallel lines in the red bow and what spacing? 

Maybe I can make my quilt labels while my mind is making these decisions. But what name shall I give this quilt....? Too many decisions!  Sigh. To be continued... and hopefully sooner than one year!