Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Finally a Book on Die-Cutting!

I have some great news to share!

A book all about fabric die-cutting is finally being released by none other than  Ebony Love, of Love Bug Studios, herself!  I am so excited to see the release of this long needed book.  For those of us that die-cut we know that there is a need for information about die-cutting.  Many of us have released YouTube videos on this topic, like Ebony, but having this information in book format is going to be great for all those people who cannot access these videos - and I know that there are lots.  Or, for those of us that want to learn every tip and trick out there!.

You can pre-order Ebony's new book by simply pledging $30.00 for her Kickstarter campaign - I've already done this and I am sure you will want to too!  She's got lots of great rewards in her program that I am sure you will want to take advantage of.

I'm egerly looking forward to the October release!

Friday, July 20, 2012

To Border or Not To Border?

Hi all!

If you have been following my Facebook page you'll know that I've been playing with these fabrics for the past little bit!

 

These fat quarters have been in my stash for years!  So I decided to pull out my Accuquilt Go!  and cut them up :-D

 
I grabbed my Isosceles Triangle die and went to town

 

Soon I had two very nice stacks of perfectly cut triangles!  Yey!!  Can you imagine how long this would take by hand!

 
Without any really clear plan I began sewing them together into the print and an off-white; and, then I sewed them into rows etc.  I really didn't colour plan this I just wanted it random.

 

After a LOT of pinning the top went together and I really like the effect!  What do you think?

Now I need to decide if I want to put borders on this or not.  I can put on borders in the off white but I don't have yardage of any of the prints.  I knid of like the idea of a one-block quilts but I might add on to get the size a little bigger.  What do you think?

Psst I will square it all up either before I add borders or after the quilting is done - don't worry ;-)

So what do you think - to border or not to border?

Monday, July 16, 2012

Look What I Found!

I thought that I might squeeze a little sewing in before I had to cook tonight and while I was pulling out a current project  I found a bag with these in it!

 

I remember putting these scraps away years ago but they didn't end up in my scrap heap so they didn't get processed when I did my big purge.  These were scraps from a quilt I had made, called Eureka, as a wedding present and when my LQS-owner saw it she loved it and wanted me to teach a class - so - I made a twin to this quilt.  This was back in 2008!!!  These have been scraps for 4 years *blush* Since I made two identical quilts I had some scraps to work with on the next quilt and now I have these left.

Ok now what to do with this?  This is quite a bit of fabric - with curved piecing.  Should I just scrap process it into 2" squares and strips or do I make something from it?  Keep in mind I really don't need another table runner - sigh.  And, this doesn't look very baby-ish for a preemie quilt

What would you do with this?

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Christmas in July!

Hi all!

I hope that you have been enjoying your summer so far.  Here is is HOT and very DRY!  We are crying for some rain and a break from the heat.

I decided to get a head start on some samples for my fall classes since it is too hot to do much at all.  I found this neat pattern online and decided to give it a whirl.
 
 
 This is the Sew Easy Strata Star by Ruth Eckersley and it is a really fun pattern to make!  It is all 1.5" strips - which - I of course cut all on my Accuquilt Go! cutter so the cutting was really quick and easy.  I love how this turned out I decided to do my first one in Christmas fabrics because I could just see it in Christmas fabrics.  Now I will have to make more!

The one negative about this pattern is the amount of waste.  This isn't even all of it - and it was just too much to throw away.  So, I started to think about what I could do with these strip sets.  I decided to re-cut them into 1.5" strips again

 
Then I randomly joined them back together to make a piece of fabric.   Doesn't that just look like a hat mess?!

 

Next, I trimmed them down (ahh that's better).

 
And, I added some borders so that this was just over 6" wide.  I layered it with some Timtex and did a little top-stitching to hold everything together.  Can you guess what I am making yet??

 

 Next, I cut them into 4 sections all 6" x 4" - now can you guess?

 

Yep!  Christmas fabric postcards!  I got out my plain fabric and my postcard stamp and made some backs.  Every year I do Christmas fabric postcards to send to friends and family.  If you'd like to see some of my previous years cards you can check them out here, here, here and here.

 

Last, but not least, I added my favorite uneven zig-zag stitch around the outside.  Since I usually need around 30 of these every year I was really happy to get a bit of a head start and use up what was going to end up in the garbage :-D

What do you think?  Am I crazy for starting my Christmas work in this July heat?

2022 Christmas T-Shirt Quilt Gift

As promised - here is the T-Shirt Quilt Christmas Gift from 2022! I did share this on my Facebook page but not on my blog, (whoops sorry!) s...