Quilting Placemats....and a Vegas View!

I quilted some placemats for Joyce today.  There were eight of them and I loaded them all on one backing....check it out!  Ribbon candy in the border and swirls in the centers....

This is something that some of you might not have thought about....I'd love to have nice placemats at my house but Ryan still gets more around the plate than in his mouth I think....LOL!  But someday....

Some of you might have heard about the heat wave....In Vegas, the heat doesn't really go away.  It was still over 100 degrees at midnight last night...and in the upper 100-teens during the day.  Like 115, 116, 117....etc.  Buddy barely wants to walk at night--honestly, neither do I.  Here is a view from my longarm room.  I was born here so I'm used to this, but I know from traveling some people haven't seen as much stucco and tile roofs as I have.  This is my house, the single story next door, and the two story after that.

The black circles on the roof are water filled tubes that help to solar heat the pool.  Hahaha.....hey, nobody wants a cold pool...and it can extend the swimming time in a pool well into October.  Anyhow, the pool pumps the water to the roof, through the tubes and then back to the pool.  And our pools are all inground-- when I went to  NY with Rebecca I was shocked by the above ground pool idea.  The trees are green and summer is here.  Not all of LV is desert....the residential areas are actually quite green.  At least my area, aptly called Green Valley.

I've spent the month of June learning to EPP.  Just to let you know, I have 53 of the stars done.  I need a little more than 100 so I'm halfway there....I absolutely love EPP and find it so relaxing.  Kind of mindless, like crochet.  Also, I enjoy not worrying about the pace of the project.  If it takes a year, then so be it.  I'd rather produce some quality work, rather than just whip out an easy quilt every week.  I find that working with smaller pieces is much more enjoyable than I expected.  Thanks Sharon!!!

I have a new sewing goal for July which I will share later.  I hope you can stay in from the heat!!  Happy Quilting....

Longarming....

I quilted three table runners this week....the first is a spiral with feathers....

The next was a summery one with beach umbrellas and flip flops....

And the last was this western/horse themed one.  I did a sun in the brown and stippled the background...my question is "what do I do with the horse panel?"....

I stitched in the ditch around the panel...but I can't bring myself to quilt over the horses.  The dark brown of the horses and the cream in the background make quilting over them seem....wrong???

Any ideas...or do I leave it unquilted?  Help!....more quilting tomorrow...

EPP so far....from Tahoe!

I've been piecing like a boss up here and this is what I have so far...about 32 stars!!

Picture quality is a little dicey because it was taken with Rebecca's iPhone...but you can get the drift!  Awesome....lovin' it!

We are watching episode after episode of the show Numb3rs....math nerd and FBI brother solve crimes and do a lot of geeky math talk.  Tomorrow we are off to Squaw Valley--Ryan should get to do some paintball and maybe rock wall climbing.  Tahoe is always beautiful and we are all having fun--including Grandma, who is a cut-throat game player! 

Happy Quilting....why aren't there any quilt shops in North Tahoe???  ;-)

The Master Plan...EPP!

I absolutely love the coloring diagrams available on Paper Pieces....this is my master plan for my star quilt.  If it turns out as cool as I hope it does you will see me wandering aimlessly around Jo-Ann's wearing it as a bathrobe until the day I die....honestly!!

My bags of EPP are packed for the trip....hexagons and 2.5" strips for more hexagons...

Kaffe strips for my star quilt.  Also 2.5" strips....and my new book!

Sadly my new Kaffe's won't arrive in time for my trip...but they'll be waiting for my return!

Happy Quilting!

More EPP....

So this EPP is quite distracting.  I'll be going on vacation for a week and I'm not taking my Juki--just my EPP.  I bought the new book Quilting on the Go and I love it!  Apparently there is a blog tour about it....the author's blog is called Life Under Quilts.  Check it out if you have a moment...

My plan is to make a big star quilt out of my coveted Kaffe fabrics.  Of course I didn't have enough, so I bought 25 half yard cuts from Hancock's of Paducah to round out my stash.  They haven't arrived yet, but soon....I decided that I had to make some sort of tessellating unit and this is what I came up with ....One star unit with three background diamonds.  This unit will fit together with the other units nicely.  I need to make 100 of these units!

 See how they will fit together?  If anyone has a better plan, please let me know.  I'm just winging it....

I'm working on making the 100 star units before assembling them.  I'll show you a pic of my plan later this week....awesome!

Anyhow, I need to go pack and get ready for vacation.  Happy quilting!

Patty L.'s Quilts....

I've quilted two quilts for Patty L. recently...the first was a black and red friendship star quilt....the lighting was bad so it was difficult for me to get a good pic.  Allover swirls...Patty did a block swap with a few members of the LVMQG and those red stars and the focal point of this quilt....nice job!

Yesterday I finished another one for Patty....this is going to be a table cloth.  Quite a large table cloth...88" x 71" if I recall.  The hexagon windmills are about a foot and a half across!  Check it out...

I did a swirling feather design in the windmill blades....

And little loops in the triangles...

It took quite a while...I hope she enjoys it!!  Happy quilting....

You don't do EPP, EPP does you!

Do you remember the anti-drug campaign..."You don't do drugs, drugs do you"?  Well, the same could be said for English Paper Piecing--seriously, dangerously addictive!  I was looking for something to do at night when I typically surf Pinterest, blogs, and online shop.  Picking up crochet again was a consideration, but Rebecca said NO to that since it would involve yarn mess and she is already overwhelmed with the quilting mess.  So I thought maybe I should learn to EPP.  I had purchased some hexagons at a quilt show a few years ago and tried to make a flower but it took forever and I quickly gave up...

Fast forward to last week and the whole story changed.  I bought some smaller 1" hexagons and my LQS and tried basting again.  I like the 1" size because the unfinished hexagon can be easily cut from a 2.5" strip of fabric and I had lots of 2.5" strips leftover from my Scrappy Trip Along that I'll never finish...I think I made about 30 flowers in 5 days....

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I sewed about 10 flowers into a column and am trying to applique it to a white background.  This is tricky because I don't really know how to applique...thank you You Tube for lots of instruction!  And Sharon also gave me some handy tips and tricks to make it easier....

One thing I was unsure of was when to remove the papers from the outside ring of hexagons.  So I just took them out carefully, after pressing the flower, and pinned the crap out of them so they'd remain stationary on my fabric.  Working with this is a hot mess since 10 flowers = about 150 sharp little pins.  What was I thinking??

 So then the applique got difficult and I set it aside to work on EPP some diamonds...2" diamonds to be exact.  Since I'm going to make a fantastic, award winning (wink!) quilt, I actually decided to cut into my Kaffe fabrics.  This quilt will be so damn awesome that I will have to be buried in it!!  No kidding, that great....I've only got 4 stars done so far (just one night's work) and it is getting easier.  The first one I did on some scrap fabric and I almost gave up.  But then I realized it was just the fabric (vintage shirt), not the piecing itself.

This is the back...I don't know what to put in the diamonds that connect the stars so I can't remove any papers...Also, I'm not needling through the papers, just basting the corners of the pieces.  I'm hoping the papers last longer and I really didn't want to poke through cardstock anyhow....

 If you are interested in trying EPP, the best source for everything from supplies, to inspiration, to coloring diagrams and free patters is Paper Pieces....They have it all!  You can also buy papers and such from Etsy stores.  Paper Pieces also sells coordinating acrylic templates to you can quickly, and accurately, cut your starter pieces.  I bought the 2" diamonds because they are cut from 2.5" strips--and the template that matches.  I can cut zillions of little diamonds in no time from my strips.  The templates are well worth the money, in my opinion.

Anyhow, my Juki just sits there...doing nothing.  I don't even want to sew on it...what now??  LOL....

Happy Sewing!

Rebecca's Quilt and the AMAZING color chart!

Today I quilted Rebecca's quilt for her Dad...it is done with the Happy Times panto....quick and easy!

And then I got a package from Cranberry Quiltworks.  Wow.  I ordered a few cones of longarm thread and I asked if they had a color chart for Permacore thread.  They said that they did but it would cost $5.00. No biggie, I've paid way more than that for some thread charts that have actual thread samples, not just a color copy of the thread chart.  Look what arrived!!  And, I ordered it yesterday afternoon and it came today.  UPS rocks!

No kidding, 6 feet of sample threads....

OMG...look at all that lovely thread!  I love thread charts and this is clearly the best one I've ever purchased...

Anyhow, only 2 more days of school and then I'm free.....Happy Quilting everyone!