English Paper Piecing Millefiori Style

There is a group of quilters that gather once a month and I'm thrilled to stitch with them. We also retreat every three months for a few days and the pieces that come from these members are fantastic. Here is one by M.N. All photos can be enlarged, and her choices of fabric is pretty fun.

As the longarm quilter, my goal is to make the piecers work shine. Simple lines, 100wt thread in light turquoise, and a ruler. That's what was needed to help finish this piece. I'm really hoping she enters it in our NW Washington Fair. Enjoy the pictures.

EPP is so portable and easy to do. I purchase my papers from my LQS. I find what I want on Paper Pieces website and then have my LQS order them in. The price is the same, but the shop makes the mark up and I don't pay the shipping. It's a win/win all the way around.

Keep stitching,
Sharon

A Journey to the Beginning

I posted about this project back in July of 2016  You can read about it here.  

Each section of this uses 63 diamonds and there are 6 sections.  You can see a piece of the black and white that was my inspiration and I was planning on having this as a project to keep me busy while my guy recovered from his shoulder surgery July 2016.  What I didn't plan on was having surgery to put my left wrist back together after taking a tumble 2 weeks after his surgery.

I pondered how to make each section and as you can see, I wanted the red to radiate from the center star.  The vintage piece was quite muddy in it's value placement, and I tried to "brighten" up the lights a bit, but I didn't want it to look too "perfect"

So this has been a long time coming, I started the process July 2016 and here we are, August 2017 and I now have the beginning of a medallion quilt.  It's a bit hard to tell, but the background is a navy blue with a little design on it.  I've removed all the paper with the exception of the outside edge, pressed and Best Pressed to get it as flat as possible, and have heavily basted it down.  I will hand applique the edge and keep the basting in until the whole piece is finished.  I don't want the weight of the paper piecing to sag from the background while I continue to add rounds of blocks to this center.

And since I had stacks of diamond papers left over, I started making stars.  100 of them.

Now I'm adding the background and will stitch this together in sections.  Right now I'm still working on backgrounds. 

I love having these take along projects in the mix of things.  It keeps my hands busy when watching tv, waiting on an appointment, or taking a break from the longarm.  I'm volunteering at the NW Washington Fair tonight, so this box will come along with me.  Fair pictures coming next week.

Enjoy the weekend, if you are in the path of the eclipse, embrace the crazy that will be coming to a town near you!  And as always,

Keep stitching,
Sharon

Prepping for Surgery

Don't get excited, it's not my surgery. My guy is finally getting his shoulder repaired after 10 weeks. We hear it's going to be a very painful recovery, but knowing that every day after the surgery brings us one day closer to being back to working order makes us both happy. He retired in February, so this was his summer of sailing and golfing and getting an old car............. surgery!

So I need to be prepared for the next week, while I sit and keep him company for a few days. What else but EPP!

I have signed up for an EPP group that starts up in the fall, but I'm getting a jump start.  Wow, are those small diamonds small. That really sunk in when the package of 450 pieces arrived from Paper Pieces.  I'm trying a "new to me" method, no stitching through the paper, so the one hole punch is necessary for paper removal with a tiny crochet hook.

I've got lots of diamonds cut.  Super fast and easy since I had scads of 2 1/2" strips in a basket. 

Using small paper clips to hold down the seams makes the basting task more manageable, and I feel that I'm getting a tighter wrap on the paper.

So far, I have a small zip bag already basted.  However, it still looks like 1000's of papers are in the package, even though it only came with 450.

I'll have busy hands along with the surgeon. If I get bored, I also have a facing and sleeve to stitch down, and a wall hanging that is marked, basted and ready to hand quilt.  This should keep my hands busy for the next few days. 

Then it's back to the quilting machine with customer quilts.  I'm staying on task and am working with a 2 - 3 week turn around right now, so if you have any tops you need turned into quilts, please consider me, it's appreciated. 

Keep stitching,
Sharon

Keeping my Hands Busy

Even though I have many projects that could be getting closer to completion by using my sewing machine, I find myself doing a lot of hand work right now. I've gotten hexi crazy, partly because I get fixated on something and partly because I need to have my sample in larger pieces by September.
After laying out the stack of flowers I have got finished, I estimate that I need twice as many, which amounts to about 50 more flowers........wow, June showers need to become July flowers! I'm working on some brights to add into the group as I find the first batch needs livened up.
Here is a peek at the red background. The idea is that it will be a table cloth when finished.
I've also been hand quilting this sampler that I hand pieced a few years ago. I didn't have a vision for this and to be honest, I just figured out what I am doing with the quilting. So far I have ditched all the blocks, outlined the applique blocks and have started the diagonal lines. I was thinking I could follow the piecing but after taking a really good look at what lines would intersect with what blocks, I've decided it will be stitched 1 3/8 inch apart. Although this sounds like an odd number, I think I will get the desired results. Here is a peek. I really love the colors/fabrics that I worked with in this sampler.
To top off my weekend, I loaded the first quilt since my surgery May 14th. Let's see if my body has as much energy as my mind has!
I hope sew,
Sharon

Out like a lamb???

So here we are at the end of March and I'm no warmer now than on the 1st. At least the sun was shining here in the NW. Tomorrow I'm taking a personal day and going to Victoria on Vancouver Island in BC. This is not a usual "day trip" but I have a cousin who is in need of a bit of company. So off I shall go.

My bags of hexagons will travel with me so my hands can be busy on the 1 1/2 hr ferry trip and the wait time in the line ups. Here are a few photos that I want to share.
English Paper Piecing with 6 pointed diamonds.
Inspiration???
Summer sunset outside my studio in Grass Valley, OR My Anna Banana enjoying a hot summer day on my studio porch in Grass Valley OR. The good life!
Stitch today :-)