Peas In A Pod

Delighted! Bunting

Hi Everyone!

I wanted to show you something I finished up last weekend.  You know that Amanda Herring,The Quilted Fish, is coming out with a new fabric line called Delighted!  It may already be available in stores near you....I know I saw it at my LQS the other day (which made me really happy, because they haven't been carrying Amanda's fabric in the past...it's good to know my nagging didn't go unheard!).

Well, one of the pieces of fabric in this line is a bunting panel.  I showed it to you here, if you want to see it.

Here is the bunting I made with it.  I made it for Amanda.  She's having a launch party in Utah for her fabrics and needed some buntings.  This went out to her in the mail the other day.  Hope you like it, Amanda!

(Aside:  How do you like the new clothesline Papa Pea built for us?  I love it!  You can see our sorry garden in the background.  I can't shoot the other way, because then you see the back of our shed, which is where Papa Pea hangs his ladders and stores some equipment.  So, that's the only downside....not a super great place for photography!)

Here are some close up shots.  You can see I did machine embroidery and spelled out the word "Delighted" for her.  Because the buntings are sort of busy, I was worried the letters would get lost in all the pattern.  So, I looked for an embroidery font that had some applique behind it.  I had a vision of what I wanted and went hunting around on the Internet.  I found the PERFECT alphabet at Bunnycup Embroidery.  (It's called Button Applique Alphabet. Click here to go to the alphabet font.)  It was EXACTLY what I had envisioned, was only $20, and was available for immediate download.  Then, when I went to check out, the computer told me that in September, the special was "buy one, get one free!"  Score!  So, I got another font, too, for free!  (The sale is still on if you want to skip on over there!)  Yippee Skippee!  I used some of my fat quarters that Amanda sent me for the background of the applique.  She has some really nice blender fabrics that read solid that were perfect for this application.  I put the more busy, yet still beautiful, bunting panels on the ends.

By the way, I found the stitch quality on these designs to be excellent.  They even provide a double row of stitching around the applique to guide your cutting.  I liked that, because I could trim really close to the stitching line with ease.  I really enjoyed stitching out these fonts!

I embroidered all the letters before I cut out the "flags."  If you so this, just be careful that none of the excess fabric gets caught under your embroidery hoop and sewn down.  Ask me how I know.  Shoot!  I had to rip one out because of that, and doing so left a teeny tiny hole in the fabric that the E was on.  Well, that became an opportunity for creative embellishment...hence, the bow.  I wanted to make sure to get some glue on that hole so it didn't grow.

After I did the embroidery, I removed the stabilizer and I did iron some fusible interfacing (lightweight) on the back of each flag, just to give the fabric a bit more body.  I sewed some backing fabric on (see below) and left a small hole for turning along the top.  I pressed nicely, with a good bit of steam, and I folded a piece of 7/8" ribbon over the top seam and sewed it on for the stringer.

(The light was better this way, so I flipped the bunting around for these photos.  You can see what I mean about the tools stored behind the shed now.)  I thought the end flags needed somethign extra, so I put some hot fix crystals on them...just for a little bling.

I went pretty light on the bling.  I'm not a huge "bling" person, but a little now and then is nice.

I didn't want to use up all my fat quarters of the fabric Amanda sent me for the backs of these, so I just picked up some cute turquoise fabric to use on the back.  I think it worked out great.  It wasn't hard to find fabric to match, because the colors are all so great on these.

I am really loving the slightly "retro" look of these fabrics and colors.  I already have an idea for a Christmas present for Sweet Pea with these fabrics.  Are you loving them, too?

Well, then, why don't you play along with me?  All of us designers are helping Amanda launch her new fabric.  I decided I'm going to do my launch online.  Come back very soon for details on that...It involves a make-and-take project, so you won't want to miss that!

Life is really busy around here.  October is crazy for me, and the craziness has already begun!  Hope you are all doing well!

Until next time,

Mama Pea

Little Forest Quilt-Along: Week 4 (and giveaway information)

Hi Everyone!

Sorry I am so very far behind.  I have been so incredibly busy at work!  I actually had this step completed on time, but trying to get a photograph and get a blog post done about it was near impossible.

I've got my quilt top put together.  I am happy with how it turned out.  How's yours coming along?  I need to get over to the Flickr page and see what everyone's up to.

I have been thinking about how to bind this, and I have a whole bunch of red binding already made up and left over from another quilt.  It's acutally the red with white flowers you see in the tree in the third row from the bottom.  Score!  I think I have enough to go around this quilt (and then some).  I am so excited to be able to use binding from my stash and something that will go so nicely with this quilt.

I see some of you are adding borders.  I haven't decided yet about that.  Need to think about that some more.

I am sorry I'm behind on drawing names from Weeks 2 and 3 on Flickr.  I hope to get that done today!

Are you ready for the next step?

Okay, the next thing we're going to do is baste the quilt and do your quilting on it.  I think I will spray baste mine, since it's so small.  I'm really stumped on how to quilt it, though.  Any ideas?  I know Linda is feeling the same way.

In the sample on Purl Bee, the quilting is just "in the ditch" between the blocks.  I'm thinking about something that looks like garland on the tree blocks and something that looks like snow falling on the white blocks.  What do you think???  What are you going to do?

Okay, so the idea is that we'll have this whole thing quilted and bound by October 7.  So, the plan was to give you a week to get it quilted.  I know some of you are doing larger quilts, however.  So, what we're going to do is one last giveaway for people who are finished and have a photo posted on Flickr by October 7 at 11:59 pm.  It's a secret, so just work hard to get in on the giveaway action.

We'll post Step 6 later this week (which will be to bind, label [optional], and get any kind of hanging sleeve or tabs put on).

Hope you are enjoying this quilt along!  I sure appreciate all your help.  I definitely would have procrastinated on this had I not felt like I needed to keep things moving for everyone.  So, a HUGE THANK YOU to all of you for helping me stay on task!

Can't wait to see what you're making!

Until next time,

Mama Pea

West Michigan Art Quilters Group September Meeting-Post 2

Hi Everyone,

Well, I've had a really productive morning at work, so I'm taking a quick lunch break and trying to squeeze in a blog post!

Would you like to see a little more from our Art Quilters group meeting?  I saw a bunch of the members at Kalamazoo Log Cabin Quilters Guild meeting last night, and we were all reeling a bit from everything that was shared.

We will start with Angelica, who created this collage.  The challenge this time was to somehow incorporate fabric/fiber and paper.  You can see here that Angelica collaged paper, fabric, and threads onto this piece of paper or fabric.  I cannot remember now which it was.  I thought this had nice texture and color.  I could see cutting this up into smaller pieces to use on other projects.

Here is June's fiber and paper challenge project.  I love the fiber border around the house...I like how it's cut with the pinking shears and attached with a zigzag stitch.  I also like the paper it's all mounted on and her creative use of color and fiber/paper to form the collage.

The month before, I think there was a denim challenge.  I think everyone was given a square of denim and asked to do something with it.  Here is what June did with hers.  Sweet Pea really  loved this, with all the beads and danglies on it.  I thought it was very creative.  It got me thinking, "What would I have done with a square of denim?"  I certainly never would have come up with something this creative!  I probably would have turned it into a cosmetic pouch!  LOL.

Now we'll go on to Kathy.  You better strap in for this one.  Kathy said she has been working really hard, so she wasn't very productive.  Ahem.  I could only hope to be as productive when I'm actually having time to create as she is when she's busy!  Kathy brought some really cool magazines and books with her.  It was fun to be exposed to so much new, rich material...like this magazine.  I've never even heard of it, have you?  But it looked really neat.

She also brought this book.  Now, I just purchased this book a few weeks back and haven't had a chance to do a review of it for you, but I LOVE IT!  It is a beautiful book, with lots of pretty stitches.  I have other stitch dictionaries, but this one has some really creative stuff in it that my other ones don't have.  You need to check out this book.  I have heard it's really expensive on Amazon for some reason, but I know you can get it on Sue Spargo's website for a reasonable amount of money.  But I couldn't find it....

Anyhoo....What Kathy dies is practice the stitches on pieces of wool.  She then cuts the samples out and glues them into her books, where she also lists what she sewed with sometimes.

I love this idea!  Makes the book even more inspirational!

And speaking of fancy stitching....Kathy has been doing Sue Spargo's Block of the Month this year.  So, she brought her blocks.  Looks like she's still working on this one.  But here's a parade of what she brought:

Neat, huh?  I would love to do some Sue Spargo inspired designs...  I love the wools, velvets, pretty fibers, beads, etc.  Fun stuff.

This is one of Kathy's pieces for the paper/fiber challenge.  The pink circles, triangles, and squares are all paper.  The rest is fabric, I think, but there may be more paper mixed in there.  I love how she free-form stitched with her sewing machine on these.  There is hand stitching, too.  Again, so clever!

You may have noticed I said, "This is ONE of..." Kathy's pieces for the paper challenge.  Well, here's the other.  The background of this one is fabric.  Kathy painted it.  I think maybe with acrylic paint.  This definitely changed the hand of the fabric, unlike the paint crayons I showed you the other day.  She stitched on the yellow with some pretty fibers.  The center is paper.

Here is a closer look at the center.  The circle is paper, and I think all the little flowers are paper that has been punched out.  I am not sure how Kathy applied color to this, but it was so cool.  Maybe if she reads this, she'll comment on how she did it.  I loved everything about this piece...the color, the texture, the design, the stitching....

Kathy said the inspiration for this piece came from this book....

...specifically this page in teh book.  Very cool.  I can see the parallel, but Kathy's piece is still unique and her own!

And this, um, is the THIRD piece she brought!  She cut up maps to make a cityscape and sewed the paper onto this pretty background piece.  Very interesting and effective.

Kathy also brought these penants from an exchange of some sort she was in.  Everyone made penants and sent them to her.  These came from all over the US and all over the world.  I think she said one came from Australia!

Here are a couple more.

And here are the last two.  The one on the right was made by Kathy...bet that doesn't surprise you after seeing all her other work!  It just looks like her, right?

Wow, okay, so that's a few more people's show and tell.  There were still about 6 more people to go!  And now you see what I mean about Kathy being pretty productive.  She makes me tired!  LOL.  Seriously, I think I want to move in with her so I can play with her more often.  She inspires me.

Well, I have to go to a meeting now.  Sorry!  I don't even have time to proofread this, so I hope there are not too many typos.  Forgive me if there are!

See you soon!

Until next time,

Mama Pea

West Michigan Art Quilters Group September Meeting-Post 1

Hi Everyone!

Wow, are these days flying by as fast for you as they are for me?!  I can barely keep up with everything!

Last week, the Michigan Art Quilters Group met.  You might recall that they invited me to join them last spring, and I went to a meeting.  I haven't been able to go since then, because I've been out of town for so many of the meetings.  I'll be out of town again next month when they meet.  But I did get to go this month.  And let me tell you, my brain felt like it was going to explode with all the incredible creativity and talent around the table.  I think I have something like 78---yes you read that right, 78!---photos from that night!  I will break this up into several posts for you.  I simply can't post it all at once.  It's too overwhelming!

Sweet Pea went with me to the meeting.  She sat and watched a movie on my iPad while we were meeting...that is, until show and tell started.  Then, she came over to the table and wanted in on that action!  Let me tell you, you would have done the same!  It was pretty fun to see an almost-7-year-old girl get so excited about all of it though.

I'll just go around the table and show you what everyone showed.

We will begin with Holly.

Holly has been traveling and buying some cool new yarns.  She showed us a pair of socks she recently made for herself.  So pretty!  I love wearing hand-knit socks.  I feel so special and pampered when I have them on!  These would really make me feel pampered!

She's now working on this pretty scarf.  She showed us her method of keeping track of her rows.  She writes them on notecards and uses a hairpin to keep track of what row she's on.  She slides it up and down as necessary.  Very good idea.

She showed her miniature quilt she had finished.  I may have shown you this before, but I never get tired of looking at it.  She used her own color scheme and her own fabrics.  I think she also changed up the design a bit.  She didn't use a kit.  This was from the George Siciliano workshop that was offered through our guild.  You may remember I blogged his visit to our guild here and here.  This little quilt is about 14" square and has 704 (corrected from my previous post to reflect Sequoia's comment below) pieces in it.  Those little center squares in the log cabin blocks are about the size of your pinky fingernail.  SMALL!  Just a great job, Holly!

Holly's husband is a biologist.  He gave her these pipet (sp?) trays he uses at work.  These usually get thrown out.  She brought them for us to play with and experiment with to see what we could do with them.  Some were thinking of stamping with them.  I thought they'd be good to rub on over fabric...with paint sticks.  Lots of ideas flowing.  Should be interesting to see what comes of this.

  Next up was Nelia.  Nelia, I hope I spelled your name right.  This is a beautiful little swallow she made that was for a previous challenge...a "sky" challenge.  I wasn't around for the challenge, so I can't really say more than that.  But Nelia said she wanted to make a swallow (by the way, one of my most favorite birds...I think they are so graceful and beautiful), but she was having trouble finding a medium for allowing her to get enough detail.  I would say she found it!  How about you?!  I'll show you what she used to paint it in a moment.  All the black on this is threadwork.  Wow.  This was so beautiful.

She said she used these Water Soluble Wax Pastels.  She said she got this set at Dick Blick for $10!  She said there were other brands that were higher quality and more expensive, but these worked well for her.  So, probably no use buying the more expensive ones.

Here are the colors that come in the set.  Great variety for only $10!  Really neat.  She said she found the best way to apply them to fabric was to wet the brush, go onto the crayon, and then paint on the fabric.  She said she liked this because it didn't change the hand of the fabric at all.  She's right.  I played with the bird a little, and it did not feel stiff or anything.  Oh, and she said that heat sets the color in....either fix it with a hair dryer or with an iron.  Then the color appears to be permanent.

Then, Nelia pulled out this beauty.  She said this is a quilt she had worked on a while back and had everything done except the stems of the bleeding hearts.  She said she couldn't figure out how to keep them dainty looking.  She said she thought that applique would be too "thick."  So she sat on it for 2 years.

She said she had an "aha" moment and decided to thread paint them.  Wow, does it look good.  She said once she made that decision and did it, it only took her about 10 minutes to finish the piece!  Isn't that how it goes?!  Look at how puffy the bleeding hearts are, too.  This was neat.

I wanted to give you some close ups of Nelia's quilting.   It is so exquisite.  Look at the small, detailed stippling she did.  And I like how she used the pink thread on the green border.  And how do you like that little bit of narrow, flat piping she put in between the greem border and the background fabric?  I think it's the cat's meow.  Remember in my post yesterday about the Pam Damour workshop, where we learned flat piping?  See, this is one place you can use it in your quilts.  Love it.

Here is some more of her quilting.  I want Nelia to give me some FMQ lessons!!!  Holy cow.  She is really good at it.

Okay, well that was the first 10 minutes of show and tell.  We were all astounded already at what we had seen, but there is so much more to come.  I think there were at least 8 more people to share.  And Kathy's show and tell will take a whole post in and of itself, she had so much stuff with her.  That's all I have time to write about now.  So, the rest will come in subsequent posts!  Honestly, this may take me about 5 posts!  Hope you can hang in there for that.

Hope you are having a great evening.  I'll see you all tomorrow, I hope.  Another busy day, and our guild meeting is tomorrow night.  I'll try to get another quick post in about art group.

Until next time,

Mama Pea

Creative Ways to Finish Your Quilts with Pam Damour

Hi Everyone!

I'm making a post this weekend, because I know next week is going to be super busy for me, and I already have a lot to tell you.  Last week, we had my art group meeting, and I have tons of wonderful photos to share with you.  I need a little more time to put that post (or it may be posts, because there are so many photos) to share.  So, come back later in the week for that.

In the meantime, I wanted to show you what I did yesterday.  I had such a busy week, I really needed a nice break.  I had signed up to take a class with Mary Lou Hallenbeck on Saturday and was looking forward to it.  Then, earlier this week, I heard about a class up in Grand Rapids I wanted to take.  But it was scheduled on the same day as the Mary Lou Hallenbeck class.  Dang it!  Well, to make a long story short, the Mary Lou class ended up getting cancelled due to low enrollment and will be rescheduled.  So, I could go to the class in Grand Rapids!  Yippee!

The class was with Pam Danour, who does really cool home dec sewing instruction....You know, like how to make good cushions, professional curtains, neat trims (like piping and ruching), etc.  In the morning, she did an awesome trunk show that showed us how to use a lot of these ideas in our sewing.  I found it really informative.

 
You may have heard of her, or you may have seen this book.  (Photo from Amazon.com) You can also get it form Pam's website.   I did not realize who Pam was when I signed up for this class.  (Sorry, Pam!)  I just wanted to come and learn some more home dec techniques.  But when I got to the class and she started talking about this book, I said to myself, "I know who she is!  I have that book!  My mom gave it to me when she gave me her Viking!  Mom didn't want to give the book away, because it was her all-time FAVORITE pillow book.  She said I had to have it."  Well, I was so excited to realize that's who I was listening to.  And it made me miss my mom a lot. I wish she had been here with me today.  She would have loved it.  I had to call her on the way home from class and tell her all about it.

In the afternoon, we did "hands-on" sewing.  I was very excited, because it was a "techniques" class, not a project class.  (Yay!  I didn't come home with any new UFOs!)  We practiced the techniques on scraps, and she had a handout explaining each one.  We then tucked the handout and sample into a sheet protector for later reference.  I loved that!

Let me give you a run-down of what we did:

First, here's Pam with her adorable little pooch, who travels with her.

How do you like her little fashion jacket?  Pam made it out of an old quilt block that she wasn't sure what to do with.  That was something that was informative about the trunk show...she showed us how she took unfinished quilt tops (some her own, some picked up on e-bay and the like) that she no longer wanted to finish and made a headboard, bedskirt, or Roman shade out of.  This was just another example.

Here's an example of the kinds of things we did.  You can see my sample piece, with the instructions and page protector behind it.  This was ruching...inserting a "ruffle" in the middle of a project.  I already have an idea for how to use this in a quilt I'm going to make for Amanda Herring, The Quilted Fish.  I will be using my Delighted! fabric.  Stay tuned for more on that!

 

One thing that was especially enjoyable about this class for me is that we used all kinds of different feet that I usually don't use.  Some I don't even own for my Janome.  For example, this is a ruffler foot on my neighbor's Viking.  I have my Viking at home, and I do have a ruffler foot for it.  I should have brought that machine to sew on for the class today.  It would have been a good opportunity for me to start learning to use it better.  Oh well.  Next time.  Anyway, back to the point, we learned to use this foot, along with our piping/double welting foot, and several others.  It was really educational for me.  (Why am I so afraid of anything other than my standard foot, quarter-inch foot, free-motion foot, walking foot, etc?)

We learned out to make and install flat piping.  This is piping with no cord inside of it.  This piece has finished edges on the red plaid.  If this was a curtain panel, then you would fold over the raw edges on that each fabric to form the side hems, and you'd still have the nice finished edge on the flat piping, without it being caught up in the side hem.  Very cool.  I have used this on a quilt once before, but never on an edge like this, because I couldn't figure out how it was done.  Now I know!  I'll be using this one again shortly.  I have an idea for it, too.

We learned to do a mitered corner.  I've done this before, but only once.  So, it was good to have the practice again.  I would like to learn how to do this so it's finished on both sides....like for a napkin or placemat.  Another time!

This was really fun.  We learned to make perfect pleats using Pam's special pleating tape.  On the left hand side, you see a typical 1-inch pleat.  On the right side, you can see 1-inch box pleats.  I thought this was very fun.  I left the tape on my pleats so I could remember how I did it.  Can't wait to try this out on something either.

We practiced making a mitered, french fold binding.  Of course, I've done this many times, but some people in our class never had.  So, I helped my neighbor with hers.  She is just getting back into sewing after a long hiatus.

We also practiced putting a binding on a scalloped edge.  I've only done this once before, too, and this was a new technique for me today.  We did it a little different than I've done it before, so that was informative.

And we learned how to install this zipper.  Pam showed us how she does this for pillows.  We made a small bag to practice.  I have to tell you, this was the easiest zipper I ever installed, and it turned out better than any other I've made.  Pam makes her own zippers, which have some special qualities that make them easier to install.  You can completely separate the zipper to install it on either side and then easily zip it back together.  Her zippers come in a long tape, so you cut off what you need and add the pull yourself (the pulls come with the zipper tape).  I asked Pam if I could design a bag and teach you this strategy on my blog.  She was very gracious and agreed to let me do that.  So, stay tuned for that.  I'll teach you this one!

 In summary, it was a great class.  I learned a LOT!  I had a lot of fun learning these techniques and was inspired more than once.  I met some new friends, too.  One thing I liked a lot about the class was Pam's irreverent sense of humor.  I was cracking up more than once.  I like that sort of thing.  I like sarcastic people.

I ended up buying some of her DVDs, because you know I like sewing my own curtains. I want to learn to do a Roman shade for the study.  I need to recover some furniture (she has a DVD on that).  I like making pillows (multiple DVDs on that) and others.  The person I was sitting next to said she went to a class the day before and Pam taught them how to make a bedskirt and how to finish the corner really nicely.  She showed me the sample they had made, and I was in awe!  I have been wanting to make a bedskirt for our guest bedroom and for Sweet Pea's bed, but I don't know how.  That may be a project in the next year or so!  I'll have to get that DVD.

If you live in Michigan and are interested in getting to see Pam teach, you have some opportunities coming up!  She will be at the American Sewing Expo in Novi, MI next weekend!

Visist www.americansewingexpo.com for details.  I was not aware of this event (as usual), but it's apparently about the second biggest sewing event in the country!  (Second only to the one in Puyallup, WA, which I am familiar with, having lived in Washington and Idaho.)  She says it happens every year, the last weekend of September.  Who knew?!  LOL.

Anyway, she still has room in her class on Thursday, where she is teaching how to make a Roman shade.  Wish I could go.  I teach two classes on Thursdays.

She also has room in her "Fashion Meets Function" class on Saturday from 12-3.  In this class, they will make the little doggie vest I showed at the beginning of this post.

She is also doing some lectures and free stage shows:  Her lectures is Righting the Decorating Wrongs (there's still room in that one).  Her stage shows are A-Cording to Pam (daily from 11:00-11:30) and 10 Ways to Put in a Zipper (daily 2:45-3:15).  You don't have to sign up for the stage shows, apparently.

I need to plan to go to this event next year. I think it would be fun.  Anyone want to go?!

She also has a show on SewOnTV.com...you may want to check it out.  I know I will.

Well, hope to see you back here later this week!  I have my guild meeting this week (with Mary Lou Hallenbeck as our speaker) and Friday Night Sew In.  It promises to be another hectic week.

Until next time,

Mama Pea