Drop and Give Me Twenty, 1980s Style

It's mid month, which means Drop and Give Me Twenty 2015 is halfway over already, and this is only my second blog update. We can all gnash our teeth and wring our hands and call me lazy, but besides my 2-3 hours of sewing every day, I've also kept from throwing my children in the snow and leaving them there during the umpteen snowdays, snow storms, nor'easters (for those of you not in a coastal New England state, that's Yankee for "redheaded stepchild of a blizzard" big ass storm) and blizzards (yes, plural) as well as cancellations of all sorts of activities brought on by said weather leaving me scrambling to make our lives work in a vaguely smooth manner.  But 2-3 hours a day DESPITE ALL OF THAT, people. Which just goes to show you, there are no challenges that cannot be overcome if one has hands, the will to live, and the ability to feel no guilt as one tells one's children they will be in the studio and not to come looking unless someone is actively losing a limb. In which case, also, just call me from the kitchen so you don't bleed all over my carpet.

Much of my sewing this month has been of the variety my friend Kelli refers to as "secret sewing," a moniker I have adopted as it fits perfectly. Two of the projects I can't show in their full unfurled delight as they are patterns in progress, but I am thrilled with the progress as both tops are done and the patterns themselves are cruising along.

Pattern one, no name finalized as most of my testers hated the one I picked. I'm trying not to be insulted.

Pattern two, to be called "Harlequin Shake"

It only just occurred to me upon posting those that I'm into the hexi shape as a block right now. Next thing you know I'll be EPPing.

Oh I know. That was hilarious.

I'm also thrilled to be included in Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks Volume 11, hitting shelves in May, and not only does this mean you'll get me in another blog tour singing the praises of being an "And More!" but it also means I get the opportunity to create a project out of my block and submit it for the gallery pages of the issue. So in more secret sewing, this week I made a really cute little project using my block and these super springy and cute fabrics.

As many of you may have heard, 2015 is The Year of the EPQD/Polka Dot Mash Up.

 What I love most about this secret project that you all can't even see, is that it already had an owner even at this "pile of fabric folded with great whimsy" stage. When I posted this photo on my FB page a friend of mine, who is celebrating a big birthday this summer, mentioned casually (eg hinted strongly that her birthday is to be celebrated worldwide) that this would make a great gift, and you know what? I'm at the point where I am drowning in quilts around here, quilts that I have made for reasons such as inclusion in the QM 100 Blocks gallery, that then don't really get used or fit in my lectures and they just end up languishing. I want them to have love, but I don't always know who would love them for me. This one, because Jeanne was bold enough to claim it right away, will have love. Granted she hasn't seen it yet and maybe she will hate it, but there is potential, and at least we know she likes the fabrics. She may even get to brag to anyone who will listen that it was pictured in a national magazine, but here's hoping that won't make her feel like it needs to be displayed in a glass case. Quilty things are made to be enjoyed. So I am thrilled to know this one will be. Sometimes it pays to just ask.

But all of this does not lead us to the 1980s portion of this post, with the possible exception of the tealish Oval Element fabric in that last photo that smacks of sunken living rooms circa 1985. So without further ado, anyone remember this gorgeous treasure I vowed to make more interesting as part of my DAGMT commitment?
No? I'd be hurt, but let's be honest. This is about the most forgettable item in the UFO bin of ANYONE who is participating, I am sure. I mean look at it. First of all, we have 1982's Pantone color of the year, Half Dead Seagull Blue, as the background. (Actually, I tried to find out what Pantone's color of the year actually WAS in 1982 so that they wouldn't sue me for defamation of character. You'd think there would be a chart somewhere on line. In any case, I'm sure it was something similar to this, but with a much catchier name.) Then we have ivory thread being used to candlewick the top. For those who do not have the honor of being a mother to an eight year old history prodogy, candlewicking is a fancy, 1980s name for French knots referring to the actual candlewicks colonial women used to use to make these types of projects.

A couple of important things to remember about this project:

 - Back in 1735, this might have been the height of fashion. That makes me sad.
 - Back in 1982, when I was 12 years old and sitting on my Ocean Blue comforter in my bedroom with Peony Pink carpet and Dove Grey accents, I spent actual time candlewicking this thing. That almost makes me sadder, and some of that sadness is directed at my own 12 year old girls who live in such a different world when it comes to leisure time than we did.
 - I've moved about eight times since then, and somehow never got rid of this thing. Nostalgia? Maybe. Horror over the geeky child I was? Oh, definitely. Thoughts that I would someday turn it into something? Of course.

So this was to be the year. And inspiration struck me last week, and just last night I was able to initiate Phase One of "Playing With Fire" as I am going to call this thing. Get it? Candle wicks.

So this pile of scraps, trimmings from the Harlequin Shake quilt I was putting together, inspired me to VFW myself some new made fabric.(Victoria Findlay Wolfe. I've made her into a verb. I'm sure she doesn't mind.) However I didn't want to sew them all together. That would take forever and I wanted them to look like the crazy mess my life is this month, rather than all neat and tidy.

How was I to do this? Enter Mistyfuse. Enter a bit of a fight between myself, the iron, and what my daughter called "spider web stuff"; the next step was to lay out a bunch of trimmings on a sheet of Mistyfuse, throw another layer of MF on top, and fuse it all together. Randomness was my goal for the look of this made fabric, and I think I accomplished it.

 Once the fabric was all fused together, it should be noted that due to the haphazard way I created it, it was pretty unstable. Yet I cut out a bunch of petal shapes from it anyway. There may have been some swearing, but I was determined. I knew this would be cool and I would make this work.

I started laying out the petals inside of the French knot petal shapes, and of course all of them were way too big so I had to trim down even further. But it was starting too look pretty cool, honestly. It reminds me a lot of that Pinterest project where you take all your broken crayons and stick them inside a cookie cutter and melt them all together in the oven and make really cool new crayons. You do this on Snowday #1. By Snowday #4 you don't care if the children are shaving crayon ends into their lunches.

Eventually all of the petals were filled and I was oh so impressed with myself. I mean, come on. How much more amazing is this now?

And I'm only getting started! Now I have visions of bobbin work, not that I've ever done it before, and some crystals and OMG I need to finish this post so I can get back at it.

1980s - OUT, something I can see finishing - Definitely IN! Yay DAGMT!

More Market Prep and Necessary Diversions From Market Prep

It's way fun around here as my family watches me turn into more of a crazed lunatic than usual and wonders why I keep forgetting to make dinner. To them I say "Thank God for Stop and Shop pickup service or you might not even have food in the house, so enough with the whining and eat a cheese stick."

Yes, the countdown to May 21, when Mom is back from Market and this person who can't stop worrying about steel, drapes, floor mats, shipping, signage, drayage, postage, and bank account balance-age goes back to wherever she came from.

It's been a long road, but I have finished all the writing and layout for the last of my Market debut and Market rewrite/refresh patterns, and a print order the size of which is about to give me heart failure is going out today. You are welcome, Smartpress.com. The office party is on me.

I am thrilled to report that "Taking Names" is one of the patterns I have finally finished. Those of you who visit my FB page now and then may have seen it already, but for those who don't, feast your eyes.

 

I am so happy with how it came out; being both a group project AND a scrappy triangle block, there was a fair amount of trying to figure out how to get everyone's blocks the same size during the testing process, but in the end it really became a stunner. The block size stuff got ironed out too, have no fear. Many testers/group participants loved making the block so much they just kept going and making more and more, and I really hope I get to see photos of them all soon.

Every participant had their own special color scheme for the blocks everyone else was making for them. As you can tell, unless color blindness has set in and if so WOW you are awesome for still being a quilter, my theme was black and white scraps with a lime background. Here are a few other color schemes chosen:

Anna D. chose b/w and yellow. It kinda makes me wish I still had my varsity jacket from high school.

Kelli F. chose totally scrappy with mint green background. You really can't get more fun, or simple, than that.

Kelli's blocks that I actually made. I believe some of these scraps are still all over my studio floor.

Glen P. wanted shades of grey to go with her orange background. She was the most challenging to us all, as very few quilters have many greys beyond in their hair. But the blocks turned out pretty cool!

"Taking Names" is finally available for download on Craftsy and Patternspot and will make its print debut in Portland. I hope you'll try it and show me your creations!

I did mention that there were some issues with consistent size of triangles among the participants, right? While in the end I had plenty of triangles to use for my cover quilt, I did end up with several that were just too small. This led to a big fix in the pattern, and I am forever grateful to my testers because without them we wouldn't have gotten it right. It also lead to my having 20 extra blocks, which lead to the brilliant idea to make them into a pennant style sign for my booth in Portland. 

You know Eva will want to hang this on the wall after the show.

Waste not, want not, reuse, recycle, and don't let all the work and fabrics from those blocks go to waste. I think it will be the perfect way to pull the booth together. Plus I got to use my newly acquired "knowledge of the color wheel" mad skills when choosing that purple, so I felt really cool. My family may even get dinner tonight in celebration.

Because I never feel complete without 45 more projects waiting in the wings in some capacity, be it in my head or in a pile of fabric on the cutting table or whatever, I couldn't resist stocking up on a few more projects last night at my guild meeting's UFO auction. I have to say, holy crazy awesome projects that were up for grabs. Almost every item was a kit complete with fabric and pattern, often with most of the blocks done, or tons of fabric yardage put together into one offering, or even quilt tops or other almost finished projects. All told, with the help of our fabulous auctioneer, we raised over 2K to help with our show expenses in just about an hour. I'm really just so impressed.

I brought home two projects I need like a hole in the head, and didn't realize until this morning that they were both holiday themed. I must have needed a little Christmas right that very minute and not even been aware of it. That would explain the egg nog craving.

My first winning, for a big fat $9.00, was this angel quilt. As Barb T, our auctioneer whom I think may have made her, said, "She needs a little help. Like maybe a face would be nice." Then the word "embellishment" was thrown out there and my Jewel-it bottle and I held up our numbered paper plate to bid on her.

Consider this the "before" photo. My goal is to make her stunningly fantastic before Christmas 2013.

So many ideas of ways to glam up this slightly dull angel. When I am done with her St Peter won't know what hit him.

For $28, I brought home 32 blocks that were orphaned from a BOM so that they could spend Christmas with me. Just call me Mommy Warbucks.

 I don't love the actual blocks - way too much white going on here - but I DO see a ton of possibilities for ways I can funk these up and, as Laurie B, who was sitting next to me, said, "Bethify" them. I've considered making a Christmas quilt for my bed for years, but just haven't ever gotten to it. Perhaps these will be the quilt starter and this will be the year.

Plus look how cute these fussy cut fairies are.

So for a grand total of $37, I now have two new projects waiting for me. Love it.

Back to the banner!

DaGMT Day 3 - "You'd Think I Was a Shoe Girl"

In reality, I probably own about 6 pairs of shoes per season. It's barely enough to qualify me as a woman. What can I say - I'd rather spend my money on fabric and apparently, this month, hot water heaters and new tires. Woo hoo!

But I do love the shoe shape for a base for practicing some fun embellishment, as is evidenced by the shoe appliques I used both in my Once Upon a Time book and my Shoeby Dooby Doo pattern. Not only are they fun to jazz up with your own shoe personality, but the shape of them is pretty simple for even new machine appliquers.

A couple of years ago before I went to Spring Market to help promote "Once Upon A Time", I asked if some quilters could help me out by making some appliqued and embellished 12" shoe blocks that I could use in my Schoolhouse presentation to demonstrate that really, the sky is the limit when it comes to what you can do with a few beads and baubles. A la Prince Charming, I returned most of the shoes to their rightful owners, but a few told me I could keep them. Today I UFO-busted and turned them into a quickie quilt.



I decided to have some fun with the quilting, and decided I was going to freehand quilt in some names of kinds of shoes as part of the quilting. Judge me if you will, but I had a hard time coming up with enough different types of shoes to do four types per block, and had to google "types of shoes". What did we ever do without google? And is it appropriate to not capitalize it? Do I care? Not today.

Witness the cute word "espadrille" quilted in. I will have you know that is one type of shoe I thought of on my own.



Sorry this one is sideways, but I am sure if you look hard enough you can see more types of shoes in there.



I also finally got to play a little with some of the Scrappy New Year blocks that have come in so far. I created an album on my EPQD facebook page and would love for you to take a look at it: www.facebook.com/EvaPaigeQuiltDesigns. I am not sure why that isn't linking like it should, but you can also get there by clicking the snowman button in the left column.

I did say under no uncertain terms that I really didn't care if participants made all four of their blocks exactly the same or used different fabrics/colors for each, but now I am so thankful to those who did all four the same because it makes my choice so much easier. I cannot believe how stunning they all are and choosing just one from some of these ladies is going to kill me.

Enjoy! Remember to keep sewing over the weekend!