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Mushrooms – Free Applique Pattern

These little mushrooms used to be available only as part of the Woodland Critters pattern, but now they’re a free pattern that you can combine with any of your animal patterns.

Obviously, they’ll work great with the Woodland Critters bundles (Woodland Bundle #1 and Woodland Bundle #2), but they’d also be fun to add to the Chirp pattern or the Wild Flowers pattern.

Or just use them on their own! I’ve always thought they’d make fun placemats. (There’s a free pattern here.)

You could add more than one mushroom to a single square or to a double-size block. The samples you see above are made on blocks that finish at 5 x 10 inches – perfect for adding half-blocks to any of my patterns.

There’s a PDF here for Added Half-Block Layouts. I’ve done all the math for you – calculating yardage, providing cutting instructions and layout guides for six different quilt sizes, from Itty Bitty Baby to King Size. Here’s what that layout looks like.

And, of course, you could make an entire quilt full of nothing but mushrooms!

For this pattern I don’t provide as detailed instructions as usual. It’s just too simple a pattern!

If this is your first time doing applique with fusible adhesive, you’ll find detailed instructions here.

Here’s the nutshell version.

  • Print or trace the templates onto the paper side of paper-backed fusible adhesive. (I use Heat & Bond Lite for all my quilts.)
  • Roughly cut around each piece.
  • Fuse to the back of your fabric.
  • Cut the piece out neatly on the solid lines.
  • Peel off the paper backing.
  • Position a stem onto your block.
  • Position a mushroom cap on your stem.
  • Fuse in place.
  • Outline stitch around each piece.

Done!

Here’s a video showing me assembling both of my sample blocks.

You can use any stem with any cap. And feel free to get playful with your colors. Mushrooms come in every color of the rainbow! I saw a shiny purple mushroom once that looked like it was made of glass!

Download the templates here.

Have fun!

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