Something different

Well to me it was quite different when I was introduced to it.  Paper piecing.  Not just paper piecing but paper piecing the Carol Doak way. Carol Doak 

We have an extraordinary paper piecer in our local guild.  She undertook to teach us in early winter 2011.  I think I sprouted feet and toes on my hands and my brain seemed to be mush.  But I did make something which is now on a chair in Australia.  I truly thought this would be a one time effort.  But as my friend the paper piecer kept on doing fabulous things it kind of wore into my head that this was pretty exciting stuff.  First there was a miniature quilt.  Some of my toes returned to the right places.  And then it was paper pieced crazy quilt which is actually close to the finish line of UFO's.  It was a free Carol Doak pattern.  Have a look at the freebies.  They are a good way to start.

This very good friend (boy good friends manage to get around you) was always doing something for Carol's Yahoo Group. Those somethings are stunning.  So a mystery one came up.  I thought I would try.  After all quilting is about challenges and I think all ten toes left the paper piecing arena and my fingers and brain had figured out the method; pretty fast considering it only took 3 projects. So I joined the Yahoo group for a scrap quilt which comes in various size blocks  (the sampler is an in thing these days).  Well I am hooked and as each set of squares is released at the beginning of the month I cannot wait to make each one.

Ok you wonder why I am blattering on about paper piecing.  Well, each month Carol picks a square to display on the home page of the Yahoo groups and this month it is mine.   I am excited and grateful and it shows that even a beginner can score a bull's eye.  Here is the main and 8 single blocks which will be in the final quilt.  It goes to prove that you can enjoy a challenge, learn something new in quilting all the time and that good friends make great teachers.  Be a quilter and learn, share and just plain have fun.  Now quilting this quilt will be another challenge.  I cannot wait.  9 more days to go.  Hortense* get ready you have lots of work to do.

* If you are a new reader Hortense is my long arm quilting machine.  Sometimes it is good to talk to big machines like that.  :)   After all it can grumble by having poor tension.

Back to Quilting

Well it is still snowing and spring has not come but my dogs are home and snuffling and snoring; I am out driving and most of all I am back quilting.  It all seems about two months but is only 3 weeks of enforced rest.  Sometimes it seemed as if it was too difficult to do anything but read.  The other day as I headed to my easy chair again I saw this.

I did not have the heart to disturb this kitty curled up on a quilt and a shawl which if he only knew was knitted with wool spun from dog hair.  So I went up to my sewing room and started to sew.

You hear quilters talk about how touching fabric makes you feel but you do not realize how true this is until you have not felt like touching it for a while.  While all outside is cold and often grey in my sewing room there was colour from touchable batik fabric.  The result is this.

 It is based on a quilt called Traffic Jam which you can find on line here.
Pat Sloan Free Patterns Traffic Jam  The guild I belong to is doing this as a workshop if it ever stops snowing on guild days and causing cancellations.

This is my version of sorts.  Have you ever read something and thought you remembered exactly what it said.  Well sometimes you read and do not take in all the parameters.  I did this with Traffic Jam.  I had read 9 patch before surgery and started making 9 patches.  They seemed big but this was supposed to be a small quilt. I should have clued in but liked the large squares which made a quilt bigger, faster.  So the sashing disappeared and a stray left over 9 patch on point became a monument in what I call Town Square.  I like it.  It fits my size requirements but it is not Traffic Jam.  You never know what is going to happen especially if you do not review patterns carefully.  But some accidents result in good things including a laugh at myself.

I am working on a paper piecing scrap quilt through a Carol Doak Yahoo Group and the February installment came.  I am still supposed to be taking it easy but.........................  Well after Town Square was pinned up the design wall is filling up with the main block and 8 satellite blocks for February.  I am so glad the puss, a chocolate Siamese, decided to curl up so that I looked for something else to do than moulder in my easy chair.  I had also forgotten how time flies when you are busy quilting but my body is still healing and it tells when I must be still.  But it does not stop my mind from planning more quilts.

When I am finally released from restrictions there will be a pile of quilts to be quilted.  So what looks lovely on the design wall will be even more lovely with stitching and binding.  Thank goodness for quilting, cats and serendipity.

The sun did shine today.  It is still there and some tulips are coming up in pots in the window.  Winter is on the wane.   Now tell that to those blasted snowflakes.