Leader and Ender Convert

It took me a long time to figure out what "leaders and enders" were.  

(Leaders: patches of fabric you sew together before you begin sewing your main project and Enders: patches you sew together at the end of chain stitching which you keep in the machine until you are ready to sew another batch of blocks thus turning them into Leaders.)

It took me even longer to figure out why you would ever want to do that.  It finally came to my attention that some people use much more expensive thread than I do and using leaders and enders does save thread by eliminating the tails of thread at the beginning and end of pieces.  But still....

 Well, I decided to try it anyway.  I had a stack of vintage inspired eye-spy patches that I had been meaning to sew up into a quilt for at least 3 years that I dug out and started using as leaders/enders.  It turns out that I really like using leasers and enders and have made significant progress on the eye-spy patches.

Some of the remarkable progress is due to the fact that I kinda cheat and regularly sew more than one patch together as an ender.  They are just so dang cute and much easier to piece than the foundation paper piecing I have been working on.  Another unforeseen benefit is that I don't have to trim threads.  Since I am always chain piecing there are never any tails to trim off.  Score!

So do you use leaders and enders?

Christmas in January

So it turns out that I forgot to share these pillow covers I made for Christmas.  

The first pillow is an orphan block (made from this tutorial) turned beautiful pillow.  I think this was the second block I had ever paper pieced.  It is a great block for those new to paper piecing.

I love, love, love this one.  To make it I simply drew a triangle on the fabric and sewed on a bunch of buttons.  I was able to sew on the buttons with my sewing machine by turning the stitch length to 0 and adjusting the width until it was the width between the holes in the button.  Then I just put the pedal to the medal and stitched back and forth about 20 times.

 It's hard to see, but I tried out quilting swirls for the first time.  I spiraled in and then paused and spiraled back out again.  I have wanted to try this design for awhile, but was scared it wouldn't turn out.  Yet again, my fears were unfounded.  Isn't that usually the case.  It seems the more I worry about something the less of an issue it turns out to be.  Some of the spirals weren't total perfect but overall it was a success.

 Leah Day has a great tutorial on quilting swirls here on YouTube.  In fact, she has a ton of quilting tutorials there.  I think I am going to have to work my way through them.  Do you think my husband would watch them with me instead of Almost Human in the evenings?  ;)

Double Star in Thirteen Color Combinations

Over two years ago I made this Double Star block as part of the Skill Builder Sampler and last week I thought that I would revisit it.

This is the block I made.  Much lighter and more open than the original.  Before I came up with this coloring I played with quite a few others.  You see, I bought myself EQ7 as an early Christmas present and had to make it earn it's keep.  ;)  (I love that program!)  After trying a few different color combos I kept coloring to see how many different color/value combinations I make. 

The first time I saw this block the quilter used this rainbow fabric placement.  I really love the look.  I might have to make another block.  :)  Here are the other designs I came up with:

  "Fire Star" blocks for my 4 year-old super hero girl.

 

I love the navy and blue color combo! 

 I grant you, there are probably easier ways of piecing some of these variations, but wow!  Pretty amazing what differences color placement and value can make.  You can find the tutorial for this block here.  

I hope you had a Merry Christmas and have a Happy Sewing New Year!
Keep warm!  The high here tomorrow is going to be -8F/-22C.  I'll be staying inside (and hopefully sewing).  :)