When last we met, I demonstrated how to fill Bluebonnet with fused/cut out fabric motifs onto the pattern ease longhorn pattern. I also took you through one way of tracing a larger collaged area (longhorn’s horns and legs) onto your fused fabric. Now onto your next collage quilt lesson.

Removing the Paper Backing on Flower Motifs and Placement – Now that your collaged image is filled you might ask … what do I do with all these straight pins sticking out of my longhorn? Working in sections, you now need to take off each flower motif, score the back of the motif with the tip of the pin, discard the pin, peel off the paper backing and discard. Now place the motif back onto the pattern ease area where you originally had it pinned. Overlap or underlap the motif so no pattern ease shows through on the longhorn. The motif back is tacky and will easily stick to the pattern ease until you have every piece placed. You can also easily move these tacky-backed motifs if you don’t like their placement. Looking closely at the photograph with the sea turtle, notice the paper backing removed from the backing. You just now need to repeat this step until all motifs completely cover the longhorn image. Warning … I have noticed that just because I have pinned down my motifs, it doesn’t mean when I pull the backing off and place it, there won’t be a few areas with pattern ease showing through. These small areas need to be filled with a motif. This happened to me on the top of Bluebonnet’s head and I just added an astronaut.

Fusing the Collaged Top – Clearly this is the easiest part! All your motifs are temporarily attached to the pattern ease. You’ve checked to see that the entire longhorn is covered with no pattern ease showing through. Now you need to have all those motifs stay put. Set your iron on cotton. Place the iron for a few seconds on an area and then lift the iron and reposition until all the areas on the longhorn are permanently fused.

Cutting the Excess Pattern Ease – Now you are ready to cut away the excess pattern ease. Your Karen Kay Buckley scissors work great for this process. You will notice on the back of your longhorn the pattern lines. Use these lines as a guide to cut away the pattern ease. But also know that you can cut around flower motifs that spill over the pattern lines. I did this on the top of Bluebonnet’s head where the flowers are located and on the lower legs covered with flowers. It can make for a more interesting look!

Next week’s collage lesson – I will move onto my favorite part … auditioning the background. Also, talk about gluing down Bluebonnet to the background, quilting options, binding and hanging!

As always, if you would like to purchase one of my collage art quilt patterns head over to my Etsy shop for full-size pattern, supply list and detailed instructions. Domestic shipping is free.