Sandy is this week’s lucky winner. She will receive Sewline’s 9mm white chalk pencil. This pencil makes a line you can see that isn’t too thick. The chalk is firm enough not to break as you draw on fabric, unless you push too hard. I use this pencil when I am drawing very small or fine shapes.
Shop pieceocake.com!
Sue H. is the lucky winner of this week’s Give Away. She’ll be getting 3 spools of #12 perle cotton in cream, medium brown, and chocolate brown. This size of perle cotton is perfect for applique stitches made to be seen, embellishing, and big stitch hand quilting. There are several needles that work with this thread—my favorite is the Bohin #9 crewel needle.
If you aren’t sue and you would like to find this (and more), visit pieceocake.com!
I cannot believe it, but I don’t think I ever blogged about the Bullseye quilt! Honestly, how did that happen?!
Many years ago, when I was a new quilter, I saw a Bullseye quilt like in a book of antique quilts. I loved it but had no idea how anyone could begin to make one. There was no pattern, just a photo. Fast forward to 2017 when I ran across the photo again and I suddenly saw how to make it using foundation paper piecing.
Bullseye Quilts: From Vintage to Modern is the result. It is a pattern pack with an instruction booklet and foundation paper pattern pages that comes inside a pretty, sturdy, book-sized envelope. The loose pattern pages make it easy to make the copies that you will sew on.
The hardest part for me was drafting the pattern and writing the instructions. You might not believe it but the sewing part is easy. All you have to do is sew on the solid lines and everything comes together.
The quilt is constructed in rings. Each ring is made up of smaller segments that are sewn next to each other.
I show you how to set in circles. Once you know how to do it, you will wonder why you haven’t sewn circles sooner. The hardest circle is the one in the center because it’s the smallest. Once you sew it, the rest are a piece o’ cake!
The instructions are clear, with lots of good photos that walk you through each step.
After I made the big blue quilt, I realized that you could stop at any ring to make smaller blocks. I wanted to do that so I drew the corner patterns that fit each ring. They are included in the pattern pack as well.
The Baby Bullseye block, below, is 36″ x 36″ and is surrounded by 1″ x 2″ flying geese (also in the pattern)
I didn’t stop there! I made one more quilt with nine 20″ blocks and 2″ x 4″ flying geese:
And then I made myself stop, even though it was hard :-).
If you would like to know more, click here to go to my website where you will find Bullseye Quilts: From Vintage to Modern. On the same page are links to some very helpful how-to videos. Happy sewing!
Mary Ellen is the winner of one of Deb Tucker’s excellent piecing tool—the Quilter’s Magic Wand. It is an accurate ½” wide ruler with an etched line running down the middle. Use it for marking or measuring when high precision is required. It is especially useful for marking those diagonal seam lines when using the Wing Clipper and other piecing tools. Click here to find a video showing how it works
Colors vary but the ruler is the same no matter what color you have.
If you are not Mary Ellen, you can find the Magic Wands here.
I announced the Hand Sewing Adventure in my newsletter but I never wrote a blog post about it. How did that happen?!
Back in the day, when Block of the Month quilting was new, Linda and I were there. Thru Grandmother’s Window was part of the first wave of BOMs, followed by 6 more. (Click here if you’d like to find those ePatterns.) Many Piece O’ Cake books have been used in block of the month programs all over the world.
In each of these cases, the quilts and patterns were finished before you ever saw the quilt. The Hand Sewing Adventure is different. What I like about this Adventure the most is that I’m working along with you. In the past, I’ve had to keep what I was working on secret until the book came out. It feels very different to show and share every step along the way with my fellow Adventurers.
I have a sketch of part of the quilt to share with you (below). I have an idea in my head of where the quilt will go. There will be English paper piecing (EPP), hand applique, maybe hand piecing (or not). I will hand quilt my own quilt. I think the quilt will finish between 48″ and 60″. You can always make yours bigger (or smaller).
The best part is that I’m also making private videos to go with the patterns! The videos make this much more like a class than just a straight up set of patterns. There are more videos in the beginning to cover techniques that will then be used throughout the quilt. You can always refer back to the videos. Links to the private videos will be emailed to you. (FYI: the videos are you, not for sharing with everyone online.)
I’ve got a private Facebook page for the Hand Sewing Adventure where you all can ask questions, make comments, and share pictures. For those not on Facebook, you will miss out on that part, but I do understand not wanting to be on Facebook. (When I’m out of town, Elanor keeps an eye on things and lets me know when I need to answer questions that she can’t answer.)
The cost of the program is $60. That covers the private videos and the block patterns. The patterns will be emailed to you and you will print them on your own printer. There will be approximately 12 blocks.
The blocks will come out about once a month. I don’t have a hard time frame set up yet but I am aiming for release dates that are on or before the 7th of the month.
There isn’t a fabric kit. The first videos show you how I chose fabric from my stash and how I sort it to make it easier to work with (that’s the fabric you can see in the header). I think most of us have a fabric stash. If your stash is small, you have the opportunity to go shopping for fabric to go with what you already own.
This is my Block 1, finished on the plane home from Italy. (That’s airplane carpet, not fabric, under the block.)
You can join the program at any time. If you come in later, you’ll have lots of videos to watch and you can work through them at your own pace. In fact, if you join now, you don’t have to keep up with me. The patterns and videos will be there when you are ready for them.
So, that’s what the Hand Sewing Adventure is. I hope you are as excited about it as I am. Click here if you’d like to join me!
Maria Elena is this week’s winner and she will receive one package of Perfect Circles. I use Perfect Circles by Karen Kay Buckley in two ways: as templates to draw around, and as a way to make circles ready to machine applique with the edges starched under. either way, they are a dandy tool to have!
If you are not the lucky winner, you can find Perfect Circles here. Happy stitching!
I spent my last day in Venice with Karen today. We went to the Peggy Guggenheim museum. She chose to live in Venice for the last many years of her life in a lovely place on the Grand Canal. This statue, that I love, is on the terrace that faces the Grand Canal. What an amazing view she had!
She was collector of modern art and there was much of it that I love…
I continue to be fascinated by the way the shadows from the art or the frame become an integral part of the art.
We ran into a small Women’s March, followed by unsmiling policemen.
We found out that garbage is collected in wheeled bins and hoisted onto boats. The collectors are dressedin bright green. It is a system that makes sense here.
I took pretty pictures that included water…
I also took photos of a seagull happily devouring a rat. We all have to eat something, right?
We shopped, but not for crazy expensive clothes or shoes (darn it).
I took a few more pretty photos of Venice…
Here I am with this homely fellow. You might notice the red gloves and very nice black bag from Florence.
I never did ride in a gondola. It was just too cold for me, no one I saw riding looked like they were loving it. Maybe I will do that when I come again.
It has been a lovely trip. I enjoyed spending time with Karen! I’m looking forward to being home, if only for a few days. I’ll be off again soon for New Orleans! The off season is a good time to go places.
And that’s it. We had a nice dinner. I think everything is going to fit into my bag to go home. Karen is helping by taking a few small things back in her bigger bag that will be checked.
