Pumpkin Peek-a-Boo!

 Look who's playing peek-a-boo in the pumpkin patch!

 

Yes, a little black kitty, possibly the brother or sister of the Pumpkat Patch kitty. 

Or maybe it's the same kitty - who knows? Sure looks like the pumpkin patch is a great place to be, especially for the Hello Fall Blog Hop hosted by Carla of Creatin' In The Sticks. If your a new visitor - Welcome!

A little more about Pumpkin Peek-a-Boo. The idea for this cute kitty and pumpkin wall hanging has been hiding out in EQ for about 2 years, with many, many versions. Finally, this year after a few more changes, I have found that kitty playing peek-a-boo in the pumpkin patch!

Isn't he so cute, peeking out from between the pumpkins? And I just love how his tail curls around and hugs the pumpkin - oh so cat-like!

With my love of kitties and fall colors, Pumpkin Peek-a-Boo combines the best of both. I am so happy Pumpkat Patch has a friend to hangout with, as this was designed as a companion piece to the table runner. 

Will they get along? I should think so, as the overall design of maple leaves and pumpkins set on a cream background provide the pumpkin patch setting. Plus the quilting is identical on both, with triple crosshatching in the background, and brown veins in the leaves and pumpkins. In the border, Pumpkin Peek-a-Boo has a few more quilted maple leaves to chase and play with.

Measuring approximately 34" x 40", the fat-quarter friendly Pumpkin Peek-a-Boo wall hanging pattern is available in my QuiltFabrication Etsy shop at a special price during the four days of the hop. With detailed diagrams and instructions, Pumpkin Peek-a-Boo is suitable for the confident beginner quilter and above. 

Need more fall projects? Be sure to visit the other quilters to see what they've created to celebrate fall. 

Monday, September 21st

Just Let Me Quilt

Websterquilt
VroomansQuilts
Karen's Korner
Elizabeth Coughlin Designs
QuiltFabrication.com
Karrin’s Crazy World
Seams To Be Sew
The Joyful Quilter
Kathleen McMusing 

It's quite the fabulous line up of fall projects, now thru Thursday, with the full list at Creatin' In The Sticks. I hope you enjoy them all!

Happy Quilting!

My Favorite Patterns

More FREE Jelly Roll Patterns

National Jelly Roll Day is tomorrow, September 19, and I've got more FREE jelly roll patterns to add to last years popular list.

Grab a jelly roll or two, pick a pattern, and sew along to celebrate this fun quilters-only holiday!

Confetti Stars table runner from Missouri Star,

 Cutting Corners quilt, also from Missouri Star,

Etchings quilt from Moda Bake Shop,

Sunny Skies quilt from Missouri Star,

Tropical Punch from Moda Bake Shop,

Ribbon Candy, also from Moda Bake Shop,

Falling Leaves, one more from Moda Bake Shop,

Super Zig, from The Happy Zombie,

Ridiculously Easy Jelly Roll quilt from Bolt to Beauty,

Granny Squares quilt from QuiltyLove,

and the To the Point quilt from Stitchery Dickory Dock.

Need more? Check out last year's FREE Jelly Roll patterns list, and visit the Fat Quarter Shop's catalog of free jelly roll patterns.

If that's not enough, I recommend these four books (affiliate links) from my shelf, all full of Jelly Roll patterns.

Love Jelly Roll Quilts - a dozen jelly roll projects from various designers

Jelly Roll Quilts - seventeen quilts with plenty of helpful information too!

25 Ways to Sew Jelly Rolls, Layer Cakes, and Charm Packs - multiple quilts in more modern settings

Scrap Quilting Strip by Strip - use Jelly Rolls or cut your own for 12 quilts

These patterns and books should keep us all busy not just for National Jelly Roll Day, but for months to come!

Happy Quilting!

Freezer Paper Piecing The Great Outdoors Tent

I love the tent so much in The Great Outdoors quilt, that I'd thought I'd put together a video showing how I put the tent together using freezer paper.

The tent in the Great Outdoors quilt was Foundation Paper Pieced the traditional way. All the seams were stitched through the paper, which was fine. 

Note: the pattern has been updated since making the video, switching the labeling of the E and F units. The multi-fabric unit F in the video is now unit E, and the new F is old background E. Though the order doesn't really matter, it just makes for a better looking unfinished block. This is the before, and the after.

Anyway, what I found was that for the large size fabric pieces in the F unit (now E), I had to use too many pins to hold it to the paper, which resulted in not only paper warping, but the fabric flopped all over the place.

Determined to continue using the traditional paper piecing method, I folded up a couple of pieces of tape and held the fabric to the paper that way. Certainly not the best idea, but it worked. 

And I kicked myself for not printing out the tent pattern onto freezer paper, my favorite way of paper piecing.

Why do I love freezer paper for paper piecing projects? Because it holds the fabric pieces firmly in place, the seams can be pressed open if needed, and there is no paper to rip off the back of the block when finished. Three big wins in my world!

In the Great Outdoors pattern, the tent can be made using either method, though I recommend freezer paper. And that recommendation brought about the idea for making a video to see how it's done, as a reference for those who have the  pattern. Of course, it can also be viewed to learn how to paper piece using freezer paper. 

The video starts out using the freezer paper foundation piecing method, where pieces of fabric are added to a unit that contains three fabrics (unit now labeled E in the pattern). The sewing takes place next to the folder freezer paper seam line, not through the paper. (Also see the written tutorial, Freezer Paper Foundation Piecing)

And as the video goes along, the freezer paper seam allowances tend to get a bit in the way, and a switch to Freezer Paper Template Piecing would have worked better. In that method, the freezer paper seam allowances are removed before any fabric pieces are sewn, as seen in this example from another project.

In re-watching this video, I will say I need to shift the piece against the machine bed more to the left, as I caught the paper underneath several times. That's ok in this block, as it's not crucial in getting things lined up, but if I had a more precise block I was working on, it would be an issue. 

Given that and all the folding back of paper seam allowances, the pieces go together to make a realistic tent. And as usual, there are tips and tricks along the way!

Enjoy watching the tent being created, and think about trying paper piecing with freezer paper, both as a foundation and as templates, on your next paper pieced project.

Happy Quilting!

My Favorite Patterns

Quilter's Project Planner Tour

Welcome to my stop on C&T Publishing's Quilter's Project Planner tour!

New this year is the Quilter's Project Planner (affiliate link), a workbook full of a year's worth of helpful, convenient planning pages and tracking logs, plus spots to keep quilt contacts, and handy reference sheets - this project planner has it all! 

As quilters, we get so tied up in multiple projects at once, that a project planner such as this will help to keep everything organized and on track.

Though the planner starts with January, one could begin using this workbook any time of year. Just start filling in important dates or events that are coming up during your year and what you want to accomplish. 

Fill in that information in the 'My Year' section, both in the calendar area and under the action plans. I know I'd be filling those areas first with all the holidays, then blog hops, then any events coming up.

With a schedule taking shape, organizing the workload becomes a snap, helping to prepare for any busy months so those projects can get done on time.

There's also plenty of space for all the usual project details, plus an area for notes of any issues or lessons learned, followed by a page for placing inspirational ideas/fabric swatches, and a page of graph paper to draw out ideas.

Project planning takes up the bulk of the book, as it should, but the next section, 'Tracking Logs', is just as useful. Here's the place to list quilt giving and shipping information, quilts for charity, and my favorite, quilt alongs, bees, and mystery quilts. With all the blog hops I participate in, this section may not be big enough!

The last two sections of the Quilter's Project Planner workbook are devoted to keeping handy information right at your fingertips. The 'My Contacts' section has spaces for quilt shops, longarm quilters, machine repair shops, guilds, quilt friends, and online quilt friends. And the 'Reference' section is full of quilty math charts which are oh-so-helpful!

Want to get started planning out your quilting year? One lucky visitor will win a free copy of the Quilter's Project Planner, courtesy of C&T Publishing. The contest is open to US residents only, from now until Sept 17 - enter via the Rafflecopter form below. Winner will be announced Sept 23.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And be sure to visit the other quilter's on the tour to see how they'll use the Quilter's Project Planner and to enter for more chances to win!

9/9 C&T Publishing kickoff  ctpub.com/blog/

9/10 Terificreations- Teri Lucas  terificreations.com

9/11 Quiltville- Bonnie Hunter  quiltville.blogspot.com

9/12 QuiltFabrication- Susan Arnold  quiltfabrication.com

9/13 Zippy Quilts- Mary Puckett  zippyquilts.blog/

9/14 Lilo Bowman  lilobowman.com/

9/15 SewVeryEasy - Laura Coia  youtube.com/sewveryeasy

9/16 Slice of Pi- Laura Piland  sliceofpiquilts.com/

9/17 C&T Publishing  ctpub.com/blog/

Happy Quilting!

My Favorite Patterns

The Great Outdoors

Escape on a camping adventure and stake your tent in the great outdoors full of fresh air, green trees, and a mountain lake!

My son's camping quilt, The Great Outdoors, is a spectacular finish, and I can't wait for him to see it. He was off touring Crater Lake this weekend, but the view was a hazy mess off smoke with an air quality reading of 200 at dawn.

Certainly not the wonderful mountain vista views he's used to, like his visit to Columbine Lake. 

Hopefully, The Great Outdoors quilt will remind him of better backpacking trips he's taken.

He has seen the quilt in progress, and picked out the tent fabric in his favorite color, orange. We got so lucky that it's the complement of blue-green, 

the color of the Kona Aqua background.

He was also very happy when he discovered I had given him a beach to go along with the small water feature he requested, as one always needs to camp near water, you know. Personally, I would have left out both because I find it distracts from the tent, and it is completely optional in the pattern. 

There's lots of different greens making up the trees, ranging from medium dark/dark, and up to medium light/light. I put the lightest value on top because the sun is shining down on those tree tops.

And can't you just feel the gentle breeze and smell that fresh mountain air? The pantograph Windswept, stitched with Glide Sea Foam, was a perfect addition to this quilt.

Ready to escape and make your own Great Outdoors camping quilt? The approximately 58" x 73" lap quilt pattern is geared toward the intermediate quilter, familiar with paper piecing. The pattern includes detailed instructions and diagrams, and is not overly complicated though it is involved with 4 different sized trees, a paper pieced tent, and the water feature with a beach (optional).  

For a limited time, The Great Outdoors lap quilt pattern is available at a special price in my QuiltFabrication Etsy store, now through September 13. Get it while there's still time to go camping!

Happy Quilting!

 

More FREE Fall Quilt Patterns

Fall is just around the corner, and that means it's almost time to redecorate the house in the orange, red, and yellow of pumpkins and leaves! To help with seasonal redecoration, I've found five more free fall/autumn patterns to add to last year's list of Free Fall Quilt Patterns. 

How about a sprinkling of some maple leaves around the house? There's this Autumn Falls pattern from Robert Kaufman,

and Hello Autumn! designed by Pat Sloan for Olfa.

Or maybe you would like some oak leaves instead? Then try this Autumn Vines table topper by Marian Shenk.

For something totally different, scatter some cute acorns on the table. These are designed by Nadra of ellis and higgs, guest posting at A Diary of a Quilter.

And add some apples to the mix with these from A Bee in My Bonnet.

These additional patterns should really put everyone in the mood for fall! Be sure to check out the Free Fall Quilt patterns from last year too.

Since I'm gushing over fall, I can't resist showing off my own Fall Leaves multi-sized pattern. 

Happy Quilting!

My Favorite Patterns