My First Tutorial

When I gave my wonderful tidbit to KarrieLynn a few weeks ago on her Freckled Whimsy's blog, I have had several people email me and ask that I give some visuals to help describe my method. Being a visual learner I should have thought about that before, but alas, I will sum it up to a blond moment, and I didn't have any. I had intended to take some pics for several weeks, since then the wonderful winter illnesses have hit my house, and all of us have been a bit under the weather. Finally, I am happy to say we are on the road to being healthy and I was able to capture some shots for all of you.

My grandmother taught me this technique years ago and I still use it today.  By following these steps, you can reduce the amount that your blocks will stretch or distort when you need to draw diagonal lines or press bias seams. 

First, Find an old, but clean piece of cardboard. mine was originally a piece used inside a shirt when you wanted to pant on the shirt, and I cut it down for this purpose.  Take two pieces of fine sandpaper and tape them down onto your board.  This makes a great surface to transfer markings to fabric. The sandpaper holds the fabric without distorting it when you draw on it.  

Lay your fabric on the sandpaper, and place your ruler on top.

Take your pencil and starting from the center of the block, Draw outwards towards the corner.  Lift your Pencil and start from the center again, and draw the second half of your line to the opposite corner. 

When you remove the ruler you have a perfect line corner to corner and your corners will not be distorted from the line being drawn. Notice that the line is darker in the center. I have a tendency to overlap my line when I start from the center and work outwards.

i use the same center principal when I am ironing a seam on the bias of my fabric (like in flying geese and HST).

Use the corner of the iron to start pressing from the center.

.Use the iron to work the seam outward from the center, on larger blocks, I will press from the center to one corner, and then again from the center to the opposite corner. 

Pressing from the center helps to keep the block square, and causes very little stretching on the bias seem. You just gotta love that! :-)

So does that make sense? I hope this helps you out. If you need more details let me know and I will gladly help. I hope that you all will have a beautiful weekend! We are enjoying some wonderful 70 degree weather!

Charm Square Quilt A Long Update

So I finally got to start my Charm pack quilt a long by KarrieLyne on Freckled Whimsy.


So I started with an "Oh Cherry Oh" layer cake by Me and My Sister for Moda. I love this line, I made my chubby chicks quilt, and I have some of this in my stash that I am not sure I want to use....well, ever! LOL


So that layer cake turned into this...

And then all of those lovely blocks turned into 25 of these beauties!


And then there was time to play with the layout. (there are like a million different layouts)



This is the one layout, and I really am partial to this layout.

it still needs 2 borders and to be sewn together, but I love the pretty colors. What do you all think?

If you look near the left bottom corner of my layout pic, you will see my tuxedo cat Abby trying to sneak in the pic...LOL If it isn't a cat than it is a little person!

Secret Revealed

pillow front
Originally uploaded by lovesewspecial

The circle of flying geese block that I made last week, now has a new home. I turned it into a pillow and gave it to my intern today. Bailey's last day with us at work was today. :-( I was very sad by this as she has been a wonderful intern.Since she is a newlywed, has a new apartment, and new beginnings, I wanted to give her something to remember us by, but would also be extremely useful...I hoped she would like it, as she is secretly an Etsy junkie :-).

I was inspired to make this block when I saw it in KarrieLynn's pinwheel quilt at freckledwhimsy.com. I love it, and can not wait to make more of these beautiful blocks. The color inspiration came from Bailey herself, as her wedding colors were green, yellow and pink. She is in love with the color pink, and I can't say that i blame her.

She absolutely loved the pillow (my heart jumped for joy). I even made the meaning symbolic to her life at this moment. It was a joy to watch her grow, and I know she will make a wonderful therapist. We had a lot in common, and it was a thrill to get to know her. You all may hear more about her in the future as she has confessed that she wants to learn a hobby, and sewing is one of her interests! I love this!! My grandmother is above smiling as we speak.


As far as other sewing goes this week, I have not been about to get in the sewing mode much this week. My oldest daughter Megan turned 3, and that has preoccupied my time.

I was able to cut out my Christmas quilt. It is a pattern by Swirly Girl Designs called Perfect Ten, and I am using Kate Spain's 12 days of Christmas fabric. I just love her fabrics and can not wait to get my hands on Fandango.

Well, I believe I have rambled on too much.
Happy sewing and Many blessings

Angie

Secret

I finally got to do some sewing this evening. This is a secret gift that I will be revealing here in the next couple weeks. I do not want to spoil the surprise. I believe it is called the color wheel, and I think I will be making more of these blocks. Fast and Fun. I first saw this block in Karrielynn's pinwheel quilt on her blog freckled whimsy. I then found it at the Sometimes crafter, with a link to the pattern here. There is a wonderful tutorial of this block at the sometimes crafter's blog. It is paper pieced and I really enjoyed making it. What do you think?

I also wanted to update you with my latest picture of my crazymomquilts quilt along. This is a picture of what it looked like at the end of week 6. I am currently trying to finish week 7. I know I am behind, but this quilt got to be a challenge real fast. I will complete it though. I can't wait to see what it will look like!

For now though, I am heading to bed...Good Night Moon!

Man is it Hot!

Well unfortunately my past two weeks have been a bit on the dry side for sewing and quilting. it has been too hot, and since my husband and I remodeled our garage to be the multipurpose room, I have not been able to get out there and sew as there is no air conditioning yet. I am hoping to get caught up on my Crazymomquilts quiltalong, and start my freckled whimsy quiltalong. Maybe tonight.... cross your fingers maybe pictures will be up tomorrow! By the way did I mention that 100+ is way too hot for me....