Year: 2020

As promised, this week we’re looking at paper piecing with freezer paper.  I love paper piecing, especially for complicated blocks.  You just can’t beat its accuracy.  While it is a trade-off between fabric and precision (it takes more fabric, but it’s way more accurate), it does make short work of difficult blocks with lots of pieces.  And no matter what you use as the paper medium for this, nine times out of ten, the paper has to be removed before the quilt is quilted.  However, this blog deals with that one time out of ten…the one time you don’t have to remove the paper from the quilt top before quilting because it’s already been removed.  When you paper piece with freezer paper, the paper is peeled off as soon as you sew the pieces together.  There are a couple of different methods that deal with using freezer paper as the medium in paper piecing.  We’re looking at both this week.

The first way is what I call the “standard” method.  This is the one most commonly used and the easiest to understand.  This technique uses the same numbered pattern that you use in regular paper piecing, but you don’t stitch through the paper.  Instead, you pre-cut the freezer paper templates, press them onto the fabric, and cut the shape out, adding an extra ¼-inch of fabric for the seam allowance.  Then you sew along the edge of the freezer paper as a stitch guide.  This helps you get the really super-sharp points.  When the block is finished, you simply peel the freezer paper off.  There is no stubborn paper to wiggle out of places where seams are joined or other tight spots because you don’t sew through the freezer paper.  This is a simple process and it’s easy to learn.

However, there are couple of cons to this method, the first one being accuracy.  Because you’re not stitching directly on a line, you won’t have the same level of precision as you do in regular paper piecing.  The second drawback is the amount of prep time this method takes.  Instead of simply printing parts of the block (or the entire block itself) out on a piece of paper and cutting just those out, each part of the pattern printed on the freezer paper must be cut out individually.  This takes more time.  However, if the quilt block has no tiny, sharp points or isn’t too complicated, this method works well, despite the amount of prep time.  The process goes like this:

1. Start off by transferring your pattern templates onto freezer paper.  The easiest way to do this is to copy or print your pattern via your ink jet printer onto the 8-1/2-inch by 11-inch freezer paper that is printer compatible.  If you have to use a roll of freezer paper from the grocery store, you’ll have to trace the pattern onto it.  Use a ruler to keep your lines straight and trace carefully.  Cut each template out on the solid lines.  Don’t include the seam allowances on the templates.  Mark each piece with the pattern numbers or letters and make note of any special instructions —  like where to place the pattern along the grain line of the fabric.

Press each freezer paper template shiny side down onto the wrong side of the fabric.  Lay out pieces with enough space between them to allow a ¼-inch seam allowance on each piece.  Using a ruler and a rotary cutter, cut out each piece with the added ¼-inch seam allowance all the way around each piece. 

Pin two units together, inserting a pin through a point in one piece, and matching it up to the point on the second piece. 

Stitch the seam, working slowly and carefully, to avoid stitching on the paper.  Stitch very closely along the edge of the paper.  Unlike regular paper piecing, there is no need to shorten your stitch length, since perforating the paper isn’t necessary.  An open-toe foot, such as an applique foot, is a wonderful option for this part, as it allows for better visibility.

Press the seam open but keep the freezer paper in place.

Continue adding pieces in this same manner matching points, stitching along the edges of the paper, and pressing seams open.

When you’re finished, simply peel off the freezer paper and sew the units together.

The next  freezer paper method is a little more complicated.  If I want to use freezer paper for paper piecing and accuracy is a complete must (in other words, there is no “fudging” whatsoever in what I’m working on – like a border), this is the method I use.  The one of the difference between this method and the “standard” freezer paper method is freezer paper will be used for a master foundation pattern, as well as for individual templates.  This method works really well for compass designs (such as Mariner’s Compass) or blocks that have super-angular, thin points, such as New York Beauty.  To begin, make two copies of the pattern on the dull side of the freezer paper.  One copy will be used as the master foundation patterns and will not be cut apart.  The other will be used as individual templates.  The master patterns should all of the individual units a block requires.  Cut the master foundation pattern out, leaving a margin of paper around the outer edge.  Set this aside.  Take the template patterns and place them on another sheet of freezer paper.  Make sure the shiny side of the freezer paper is facing down for both sheets, and press them together with enough heat so that they bond securely together.  This makes your templates a bit sturdier. 

Cut out the paper piecing units, leaving a margin of paper around them.  Then cut the individual units out on the solid line.  Now you have your templates.

Press the templates to the wrong side of the fabric, leaving about one inch of space between the templates.  Cut them out, leaving about ½-inch seam allowance around each side. 

The dotted edge (the edge with a small dotted line) is the side that we need to turn.  Go ahead and plug in your iron (a small travel iron or a mini-iron works best), gather some spray starch and a small brush.  With the brush, paint some of the starch on the dotted edge fabric  seam allowance.  While the starch is still wet, fold the seam allowance over the template and press until dry.  Pull the template off and press again if you need to.

Repeat this process for all dotted edge seam allowances. 

Take the master foundation pattern to your pressing surface and place it shiny side down to the pressing surface.  Pin the first template piece that you’ve prepped with fabric onto the surface, wrong side up.  Make sure the fold aligns with the seam line on the master foundation pattern.

Place a thin line of basting glue on the fold line of the first piece.  Make sure to place the glue only along the edge where the second piece will overlap it. 

Place the second piece, wrong side up, on the master foundation pattern.  Be careful that the fold of the second piece aligns with the seam line of the master pattern.  Heat set this. 

On the second piece, put a fine line of basting glue on the fold where the third piece will go.  Place the third piece the same way you did the second piece and heat set. 

  Continue in this manner until you’ve assembled all the pieces in a unit.  When you get ready to give it final press before sewing, because there are no papers involved, you can press the seams however you need to (and to the darker fabric as much as you can).  But if you need to reduce bulk so it can be quilted easier, you can press the seams open or to the light side if you have to. 

Now you have to sew the units together.  The numbers on the patches in the master pattern indicate the sewing sequence.  I do shorten my stitch length a bit.  My default stitch length is a little long (in my opinion) for any piecing, so I always shorten it a bit.  A quarter-inch foot or an open-toe embroidery/applique foot works wonderfully for this.  Put your needle in center position and if your machine has an up/down option, program it for needle down. 

Lift one of the units off the master pattern and open the first seam until you can completely see the crease left by the fold.  Sew slowly and carefully directly on  this fold.  After completing the seam, trim the seam allowance to a scat ¼-inch.  Following the numerical sequence, continue sewing the seams in this manner.  Once all the units are made, you’ll need to check it against the master foundation pattern one more time.  Take the master pattern and press it onto the right side of the pieced unit, making sure to align the pattern lines with the seams.  Trim the completed unit so that the outer seam allowance measures ¼-inch.  Make as many units as your block needs, then sew the units together to make the block. 

A couple of hints at this point.  On average, the templates can be used seven to ten times before the edges get too soft and won’t give you a crisp fold.  If you make several sets of templates and set this process up as an “assembly line,” you’ll find this goes pretty fast.  I mentioned before in my blog on hand applique, that it’s important to use a type of basting glue that doesn’t your fabric stiff.  That’s important, here, too.  Even though you’re sewing with a machine, and that has lots of power behind the needle to go through layers of fabric and glue, you don’t want to have it leave the fabric feeling stiff or possibly breaking your needle.

I hope you consider one (or both) of these methods the next time you need to paper piece a block.  With a little planning and some extra prep time, you may find you really like this method.  Bonus…when you’re through, there are no pesky papers to remove.

Until next week, Level Up Your Quilting!

Love and Stitches,

Sherri and Sam

It’s not all about the quilts.

It’s about the quilters – the fellowship. 

It’s about sharing the good times and the bad.

It’s about multiplying the joys and halving the grief.

It’s about taking the scraps life hands you and sticking your finger in fate’s eye when you make something beautiful out of it.

That’s what quilting is all about.

–Sherri Fields, May 2012

When I decided the theme for 2020 was “Leveling Up,” a lot of thoughts ran through my mind.  I knew I could emphasis more advanced quilting techniques.  I knew I could push daring color choices and placement.  I spent Thanksgiving week pouring over blog ideas I had never written about because I didn’t know if my reading audience would follow them.  I re-read books and articles that had challenged me to become a more advanced quilter.  Then I made a list of 45 ideas for this year.  And at the top of the list was you – the quilter.

There are all kinds of quilters in this world.

And thankfully, there is enough fabric, thread, and (generally) acceptance for all of us. 

This year, along with talking about some complex quilting techniques, I want you to focus on you, too.  We all wear lots of different “hats.”  We’re mothers and sisters and daughters and employees and employers.  We’re sons and fathers and brothers.  We’re in-laws and significant others and professionals and retirees.  We’re at various stages of life.  Some of us are taking care of small children and some of us are taking care of aging parents.  Some of us are widows, some of us are childless, and some of us are raising our grandchildren.  Some of us are dealing with a sick spouse or with our own health issues.  We’re all at different stages and at different places.  But the tie that binds us together is quilting and all of its creativity, chaos, and color.  No matter what technique or designer or fabric line we like best, get a bunch of quilters in a room and the talk quickly turns into the Fellowship of the Quilt. 

This is important.  And that’s why we need to take care of us as much as we take care of our fabric.  What do I mean by this?  I want each of us to define our quilting journey as uniquely ours and not compare it to anyone else’s.  I could never design quilts like Kim Diehl.  But you know what?  That’s not my quilt journey.  Each and every quilter has his or her own creative path they carve out for themselves.  My path is not your path.  I (almost) visibly cringe when I hear another quilter say, “I could never quilt like you.”  Know what?  You shouldn’t.  You should quilt like you.  And you should cultivate what makes you great as an artist and strive to make each quilt a little better than the one before.  What you shouldn’t do is compare yourself with other quilters. 

When I started quilting back in the mid-eighties, it became all-consuming.  During that time, I had small children and still made all of their clothes and most of my own.  I worked and my spouse worked out of town a lot.  This meant that my quilting time was limited.  I primarily followed patterns or took Saturday classes.  Once Target opened in my city and , my made children’s clothes a relatively cheap purchase, my sewing time freed up more, and I started to seriously quilt.  I began to take patterns and put my twist on them.  There were quite a few failures, but there were a few successes, too.  And I soon found out that I enjoyed “doing my own thing” much more than always following the directions.  I began to play with proportions and settings and color placement. 

Here began my creative path as a quilter.  These were the days before the internet, Facebook, and Instagram.  At this point in time, I had never heard the word “blog.”  The local public library was my Google and Hancock Fabrics was my quilt class.  Consciously or unconsciously, I was exposing myself to more quilts and quilters.  My interests began to expand.  I dabbled in art quilts.  I tried new techniques.  I wasn’t afraid to fail, and I didn’t know enough to be too intimidated by another quilter’s quilt.  I refer to this period in my quilting life as “Free Fall.”  I’d try just about anything and didn’t mind spending time with my seam ripper if things didn’t go as planned. 

This year, along with learning new techniques and playing with color and patterns, I want everyone to become sensitive to their creative process.  If you need to hit the pause button on your quilt journey, do so.  Sometimes time away from quilting is what you need to “reset” yourself as a quilt artist.  Sometimes that pause means leaning solely on patterns or kits just so you don’t have to think so much.  We’ve all been there, and usually the quilt mojo returns (either in a trickle or in a flood), and we release the pause button and hit play again. 

It’s also important to document your muse.  In other words, keep those things that inspire you near you.  The cell phone is actually a great help in this.  Take pictures of flowers or trees or buildings that inspire you.  Quilters are often inspired by non-quilty things.  A catalogue that comes in the mail.  Paint chips from the hardware store.  A design on a scarf, in a tile, or even in a wallpaper that we just have to reproduce in fabric.  Any and all of these things can push us towards our next quilt.  I keep pictures in a file on my phone.  I have several Pinterest boards.  I also keep a physical file folder with clippings and such that stir my muse.  Sometimes it’s color.  Sometimes it’s texture.  Sometimes it’s a pattern.  But it’s important to me that I keep them accessible.  They help me in two strategic ways:  If I am planning a new quilt, they give me inspiration.  If I am pushing my way through a project, they give me an added desire to finish it so I can move on to other ones.  It’s equally important to note that you need to document what inspires you.  What works for me may not stir any inspiration in you.  With me, it’s all about color.   Nine times out of ten, it’s colors that that inspire me.  Patterns make up the other one-tenth.  What works with your muse may be something entirely different.  And that’s okay. 

This year as we are challenging ourselves to try more complicated techniques and patterns, let’s stay sensitive to what inspires us as well as to what challenges us.  As we each carve out our own quilt journey, let’s not compare ourselves with each other, but encourage each other and hold that individual quilt path as nearly a sacred experience.  Next week we really begin our Leveling Up when we will look at a new way to paper piece.  Have your freezer paper center front and ready.

Meanwhile, don’t be afraid to try something new!  Level it up!

Love and Stitches,

Sherri and Sam

Here we are at 2020.  I don’t know about you, but 2019  flew by so quickly, it’s hard to believe we’re in a New Year. 

New Year.

New Goals.

New Theme.

But before we get into all of that, let me give you my State of the Quilt thoughts and go into the predictions I had for 2019, as well as my thoughts about what may be happening in the 2020 quilt world.  I had three predictions for 2019: 

1.  A Return to Traditional Quilting
2. More Acceptance of Embroidery Machines as Part of the Quilting Landscape
3. The Layout of Fabric Stores and Quilt Shops will Continue to Change

Let’s take them one at a time.

A Return to Traditional Quilting – I think I was dead on with this one.  Last year I thought it there would be a resurgence of traditional blocks, hand piecing, and hand quilting.  If there was one niche in the quilting world that specifically backed up this prediction, it is the explosion in popularity of English Paper Piecing.  While personally I don’t enjoy this technique, obviously hundreds of other quilters do.  With this revival of EPP, certain traditional quilt patterns and blocks also enjoyed shaking off the cobwebs and basked in the glow of popularity.

More Acceptance of Embroidery Machines as Part of the Quilting Landscape – Not only did embroidery machine work earn a place at the quilting table, but hand embroidery also has garnered a good deal of exposure this year.  Many quilt patterns incorporated hand embroidered blocks.  Not to be left out of the party, many applique patterns encouraged details performed with hand embroidery.  And embroidery machine programmers designed programs  for the embroidery machine that will allow you to quilt your quilt in a hoop. 

The Layout of Fabric and Quilt Stores will Continue to Change – This is one of those good news/bad news issues.  The landscape of the retail quilt world continues to evolve and unfortunately part of this evolution includes shuttering more of the brick-and-mortar quilt shops.  The biggest of these in 2019 was probably Keepsake Quilting. 

When I began quilting in 1986, Keepsake was at the forefront of the quilt world.  If I couldn’t find what I needed in Hancock Fabrics or one of the local quilt shops, the next place I’d look would be Keepsake.  Those were the days before the internet.  I’d hang on to the old Keepsake catalog until a new one came out.  Through the years, Keepsake changed hands a couple of time, until fairly recently one of “my” local quilt shops purchased it – Pineapple Fabrics.  They kept it open for a while but the distance between Keepsake and Archdale, NC (where Pineapple is located), as well as declining sales coupled with increasing costs of the brick-and-mortar establishment proved to be too much.  Like many quilt shops, Keepsake will live on in the internet world, but the shop itself if is closing. 

Okay, that’s the bad news.  The good news is the quilting world is keying into the next generation of quilters, while trying to keep us long-established ones happy.  The costs of sewing machines is declining, as technology continues to get cheaper.  Fabric manufacturers are still churning out their goods, but the colors are changing and growing somewhat brighter.  And there are more “niche” fabric producers, such as Spoon Flower that allow you to design your own fabric and have it printed.  With this sensitivity to the younger generation and their shopping habits, there are more available on-line stores to purchase your fabric.  And while I still encourage, urge, and push quilters to buy from their LQS, it’s nice to know that home-bound quilters now have everything at their fingertips. 

However, I do miss the days when I could go to a fabric store and see two or three of my friends there or make new quilty ones.  And I really miss the days when I could run into Hancock Fabrics and purchase machine needles at 8 p.m. on a Friday night after my last one broke and I was in the middle of a project.  Now I must Prime them because there are no fabric stores in High Point. 

None.  Not one. And I’m not counting Hobby Lobby.

Now my predictions for 2020….

Technology will continue to change our quilt world, both for the good and the not-so-good.  I believe that on-line classes and how-to YouTube videos will increase more and more as the next generation of quilters step up to the plate.  They’re the group that seems completely at ease with on-line teaching, as many of them have had this type of instruction in undergrad and grad work.  For us older quilters, this is awesome because it allows us to plug into designers that may never make it to our area.  The downside to this is there will be fewer “physical” classes.  With more and more brick and mortar stores closing, we quilters are losing precious classroom space that is difficult (if not impossible) to re-gain.  And in this process, we are losing one of the most valuable parts of quilting – the fellowship with other quilters. 

More technology means cheaper price tags on things like sewing machines and long arms. It also means more competition between brands and manufacturers.  And this means quilters will be able to afford machines and gadgets they never thought they would be able to purchase.

Quilt groups will become smaller.  With the rise in quilty technology, the number of on-line groups will continue to grow. The results could be the possibility of shrinking membership of physical bees and guilds.  This possibility bothers me a great deal, as quilt bees, guilds, and groups are a vital part of our quilting heritage.  If we have to wage war against any of these predictions, this is the one we should choose. 

This year may be the year that there is a resurgence in quilt preservation.  I am old enough to remember our bicentennial year – 1976.  With America’s 200^th anniversary, there was a rising interest about quilting and antique quilts.  From that point in time, well into the 1980’s, many states had groups of quilters organize to document and photograph old quilts.  I have North Carolina Quilts book from this time.  It’s one of my prized possessions. 

I think with this new decade, we may very well begin to hear some rumblings from quilters that “We need to do this again.”  God knows its time – some of the quilts that weren’t eligible for the last round of documentation (because they weren’t old enough), would be up for it now.  This should be done.  If it’s not, we’re on the precipice of losing a good chunk of our quilting heritage.

And a side benefit of this may be an increase in numbers of folks that are interested in quilting. 

Predictions now out of the way, it’s time to announce the 2020 blog theme!  In 2017, we Quilted Fearlessly.  I urged you to get out of your comfort zone and try new things…harder things…stretch yourself as a quilter.  In 2018, we Quilted with Excellence.  I wrote a lot of “teachy” blogs, emphasizing the basics and encouraging you to embrace each step of the quilting process with your best work.  If I remember correctly, there was a lot of math involved in some of those blogs.  And those blogs still receive a lot of hits – especially the ones involving quilting and the Golden Ratio.  This past year, we Quilted with Passion, throwing our whole selves into the craft we love.  All three of these years have been a build up to 2020’s theme, which is:

Level Up!

What does this mean?  Well, if you or someone in your life is into any type of video gaming or games like Words with Friends or even Solitaire, you’re aware you “level up” – or go to the next level – after so many points are scored or certain skills are attained.  After Quilting Fearlessly, Quilting with Excellence, and Quilting with Passion, we are ready to push our quilting to the next level.  We’re ready to “Level Up.”  Details will be examined, reasoning will be questioned, directions will be dissected, and new skills will be tried.  I’m excited about this.  So, pull out your fabric, fire up those sewing machines and in 2020….

Level Up!

Love and Stitches,

Sherri and Sam