Here are some of my favorite picks:

30% Off! Serenade by Kate Spain Layer Cake

20 % Off Gypsy Caravan by Amy Butler Fat Quarter Bundle

20% Off Good Fortune by Kate Spain 1/2 Yard Bundle

Lots of ways to enter! This giveaway is open Internationally and closes 6/1/13 at midnight EST.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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I also ordered a rollie polie of the Riley Blake small chevrons. I’m going to use this for my first midi bag class and make myself a little midi tote bag out of them! They’re going to be super cute on the bag I think.

The last few nights I’ve been spending some quality time with my new pattern Pixel Lattice. I have a small sample quilt done but I may augment it for a design update that I want to do to the pattern. I wanted the option to have the quilt “float” if someone wanted to do a smaller size. Tonight I created a smaller block so you can add these and create a floating on-point version of the lattice motif. I’ll be working on updating the pattern and notifying the purchasers of the update in the coming week or so.

Here’s a preview of the “floating” version of Pixel Lattice which I think is really neat! You can always add more blocks around it for a different look too.

And lastly a little snapshot of all my Gone with the Wind fabrics awaiting to be cut up and sewn into a fun wall quilt for myself.

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I am so excited to show you my first pattern for sale! I love this block so much because of how many design possibilities it provides. It can be a scrap buster, meticulously planned colorway, monochrome, dark, light or rainbow block and it all seems to work beautifully!  The block leaves you a nice diamond area to do fancy quilting or applique in when you piece several together.

Pixel Lattice - $3 at Craftsy

The little squares really do look like tiny pixels intersecting across a quilt. I think I had more fun creating different colorways in Electric Quilt using this block than anything else. So many possibilities! The PDF instructions and templates include the following block sizes:

• 4″ Finished Block
• 6″ Finished Block
• 8″ Finished Block
• 12″ Finished Block
• 14″ Finished Block

Here are a few of the blocks created using this versatile paper pieced pattern:

The resulting quilts are gorgeous. I can’t wait to work on a wall quilt for myself.

My good friend Daisy took on the challenge of testing my smallest blocks which she requested herself! Look how cute her tiny blocks are (these are the 4″ and 6″ finished blocks):

Don’t you love the dark colorway? The black background fabric really makes it pop.  I hope you give my pattern a try. It’s a great pattern for beginner paper piecers to work on, especially the 8″ and 12″ sizes.

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I’ve been working on a bit of a website overhaul the past week or so. My old design was beginning to irritate me and kind of wanted a fresh start with something new.  This new design will automatically resize itself based on the size of your browser you open it on – even if it’s on an iPhone! Give it a shot, it’s kind of neat to see the resize happen.

I’m still reorganizing a few things and want to make certain items in my blog easier to find (like organization tips, product and book reviews, etc.) so there will be some tweaking along the way.   My husband helped me get the new theme to properly play mp3 files in a little player and offer a download link again.   So if you notice anything strange or something not working let me know please!

Sneak Peek

The last few days I’ve spent in design mode. Yesterday I came up with a fun block that had to be paper pieced. It turned out so cute I decided it would be my first pattern for sale. It will be released this week (possibly tonight if I can get everything finalized). I have a few friends testing the pattern for me today. It’s good for beginner paper piecers. Take a look at Pixel Lattice!

The design creates a great lattice effect when multiple blocks are sewn together. I really had fun playing with the different colorways for this block. So many options work well with the design. Look for the pattern this week! It will come in five sizes and will be $3 for a PDF download off of Craftsy.

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My Artograph Light Tracing box came in very handy for all the tracing! I may need to get some micron Pigma pens in different colors to do some of the details on the sea creatures. The seahorse in particular is going to need lots of detail I think.

I’ll be spending some time this weekend testing out colors to see how close I can get to real tropical fish. I’m also going to experiment with coloring my own background fabric!  I’m using a mixture of decal photos I found online to give me a base for my template and an idea for what the colors should look like.   Some fish don’t lend themselves very well to this technique but others seem like they’d be perfect for it. I may try a few different ones before settling on which I’ll be using for the class.  I’m very excited to see how well they color!

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This is a wonderful activity sponsored by a great designer – Geta’s Quilting Studio. I think it’s a great idea! You can click the photo to see lots of other bloggers answers to the questions she asks. These are mine.

List a few of your favorite quilting notions.
I have a few that I continuously use on nearly every project.

That Purple Thang – this very simple idea comes in handy for so many things. I think it’s saved my fingers more than once since I can stick it near the needle and keep my fingers safe. It also has a very useful 1/4 marker on the other end that I’ve used quite a few times when putting on my binding so I know I can get exactly 1/4″ away from the edge. I’ve also used it when doing mitered borders. I have two just in case I inevitably lose one.

Cuticle Scissors – Quilting notions are expensive and sometimes I wonder if they jack the price up just because it’s sitting in a quilt shop. I save a few bucks and get cuticle scissors to use for trimming threads for machine embroidery, trimming applique fabrics, snipping corners and much more. They’re sharp and get in close when you need it to. The curved edge really helps for machine applique.

Fiskars Comfort Grip 60mm Rotary Cutter - I ditched my small rotary cutter and haven’t looked back. I love the fact that I can cut multiple layers of fabric without having to press down really hard. The large blade lasts quite a while. It automatically retracts when I’m done cutting so I don’t have to worry about dropping it on my foot or my dogs if it gets knocked off the cutting table. You can also keep it open with a little button if you want but I rarely use it.

Any advice for a successful color scheme of a quilt?

I shared this tip on my Bargello Quilt Along. Value is what you want to look for with most patterns. It can be hard to assess value just by looking at your fabric as it is.

I have an app on my phone that lets me turn any photo I take into grayscale so I can instantly see the values when I lay out my fabrics. Find a photo app and use it or use the black and white setting on your point and shoot camera. Do it in the fabric store! They don’t care if you’re laying bolts out to decide what to buy.

If a pattern looks good in grayscale you won’t have a hard time choosing fabrics to go into it.

Some thoughts about thread and needles, batting, fabrics ?

Threads for quilting and piecing: I’m an Aurifil addict! I get my Aurifil thread from The Quilt Bear (buy 3 get 1 free plus get 10% off with coupon code PODCAST). I piece all my quilt blocks using 50 wt Aurifil thread color 2021. For quilting I’ve used all sorts of different colors and sizes, from 28 wt all the way up to 50 wt. I love their variegated threads.

Thread for machine applique: If I want it to be invisible I use Aurifil monofiliment thread. That stuff is amazing, completely heat resistant (you can put an iron on top and it won’t melt), my machine runs it like it’s regular thread and it lasts a very long time.

Needles: 

• Piecing: 75/11 Schmetz Quilting Needle
• Quilting: 75/11 or a 90/14 Schmetz quilting needle depending on my thread
• Machine Applique: 60/8 Microtex needle when using a monofiliment. It makes a very small hole so it can barely be seen. For regular threads I use a 75/11 Quilting Needle.

Tips for easy piecing

Nest your seams! If you have two intersecting seams you can get them to nest and properly come together by pressing the seams in opposing directions.

Other tips related to quilting

Foot pedal moving around on you? Is it never where you think it should be when you go to sew? Tape a piece of shelf liner to the bottom.

Do you have free tutorials on your blog? Share the link.

I have several free tutorials available! http://katiesquiltingcorner.com/tutorials

The sewing machine – share a few things you love at your sewing machine; what makes it special? What features do you think are the most important to a sewing machine used for quilting?

I have four different sewing machines and you can read all about them here. My main machine is a Pfaff Creative 2.0. I purchased it used last December to replace my terrible Viking Topaz 20 and it has been a complete joy to use.

Features I couldn’t live without:

• Needle up/down with hover capability which is useful for machine applique
• Large throat area (mine is 10″ to the right of the needle)
• Automatic Thread cutter
• Tie off/on
• IDT Foot (this is Pfaff’s built in walking foot and it really makes a difference)

What about modern quilting tools? Quilt software, die cutting systems, other tools? Why do you like them ?

I have an Accuquilt Go! system that I love. I mainly use it to cut strips and squares for scrap quilting. It is a time saver. There is some waste involved but I’m okay with that. The company has fantastic customer service if a die isn’t cutting correctly they’ll replace it for you.

Artograph Light Tracing Box - this thing is awesome! I use it all the time for my machine applique adventures – especially the ones involving melted crayon applique. It just makes tracing the shapes onto your fusible web easy to do since it’s backlit. You don’t have to strain your eyes to see the lines to trace.

Tips for organizing the sewing tools, the fabrics, the sewing studio?

I have several posts devoted to organization. Here are some of my favorite organizing tools:

My Clip it Up Organizing System - so great to organize fat quarters or smaller cuts of fabric that won’t fit on a comic book board.

Thread and Ruler Organization – I got frustrated last year and decided to convert to a pegboard system. You can read about my adventure and what materials I used.  Painting the pegboards wasn’t difficult and it’s now one of my favorite things in my sewing space.  I think for the pegboard, hooks, and paint I spent less than $100 for everything.

Could you recommend a book to someone who just started quilting ? A quilting bible ?

I like this one a lot. It’s hard to pick just one book. I’ve also used Quilting for Dummies when I was first starting out. I recommend going to your local library and checking out several beginner quilting books since each one words things a bit differently.

Books can be addictive and you’ll find that with some books you only want to use one or two patterns. It’s cheaper to just check the book out, learn the technique or do the pattern and turn it back in.

List one or two of your favorite quilting techniques and a tutorial/pattern/book where you learned about them ?

My absolute favorite book of the moment is Creative Quilts from Your Crayon Box. I love this technique so much I started teaching classes on it at my local quilt shop so I could get other people addicted to it too. The book has beautiful patterns inside it and step-by-step instructions on how to color your applique shapes. It can be applied to so many other things. I think it’s a useful technique to have in your machine applique arsenal.

I’ve done the small practice sample and then I jumped all over my favorite pattern in the book and completed the large Iris quilt. Right now it’s living at the quilt shop where I teach.

Do you have a favorite quilt designer ?

Kimberly Einmo! I love all of her designs and I’m so happy to have had the pleasure to take several of her classes in person.

Do you have a favorite quilt blogger?

That’s like asking me to choose my favorite corgi… it can’t be done!

Would you like to share one of your favorite quilts, made by you ?

Rainbow Insomnia Wallhanging

Do you have a favorite online quilt shops ? What makes it special ?

Fat Quarter Shop – For stash building I purchase their 12 Pound Fabric Grab Bag here. They typically also carry the latest fabric collections and you can get notifications when future collections are released.

ThousandsofBolts.com – I love to purchase my background fabrics here. It’s easy to find neutrals that you can add to your stash because they have a neat color selector tool. Most of the background fabrics I’ve found are under $5 per yard for quilt shop quality fabrics.  They feel wonderful! She has a nice selection of wide-back fabrics and batiks that are reasonably priced.

Missouri Star Quilt Company – they have great prices on daily deals and in general for precuts. Sign up for their daily deal newsletter and you’ll find out what deal they have each day on a precut! The jelly roll and layer cake deals are worth it since shipping is usually $5+ on top of your order.  Still, you can figure on saving $10 for a jelly roll or layer cake from MSQC.

The Quilt Bear– This is a great online shop where I purchase my Aurifil fabric.  They have FREE SHIPPING on all U S orders. I mainly go here for white and black Aurifil thread. Mary Jo can get any color or weight you want in usually the next business day since she’s very close to an Aurifil distributor, just e-mail her to ask for it.  Every Friday they have happy hour from 4-6PM EST and you can get 15% off your order!

Use coupon code PODCAST to save 10% on your entire order at The Quilt Bear!

What would be the perfect gift for your best quilting friend?

A gift card to a local or online quilt shop (whatever their favorite place is!)

Don’t Do Like Me!

I think my biggest mistake so far is not fully researching a dealer before buying my first big sewing machine. I had a pretty horrible experience with a Husqvarna Viking dealer and corporate office. I’ll never buy another one. You can read all about my Husqvarna Viking saga here.  I got rid of my Viking machine in January and will never purchase or walk into a Viking dealer ever again.

Part 1: Why I Will Never Again Purchase or Recommend Husqvarna Viking Sewing Machines

Part 2: Final Thoughts on Husqvarna Viking

Part 3: Viking Dealer BBB Complaint Response

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And I talked about my purchases from Inspire! on the podcast but now you can see them here. Some fabric and a pattern for an iron caddy (it looks really fun I hope to work on it this week).

My lighting for my room is getting better thanks to a few Ottlights I found on clearance. They went together pretty quickly and I put one on either side of my sewing cabinet. I love that they have a foot control for on/off (I wish it was glow in the dark though). They are bright! I don’t think I’ll have to worry about my room being a dark dungeon for a while. I like that they’re pretty too and not the utilitarian style.

I think the one next to my club chair will be handy when I’m binding and such.

I talked about my Gone with the Wind fabric obsession on the last podcast and it started coming in! I particularly like this panel:

I think I just have one piece left to get and I’ll have most of it to plan a quilt with. Last night I decided I was going to embroider some of the famous lines from the movie onto the wall hanging. It’ll be a tribute to my favorite film.

Here are two of my corgis looking out their new favorite window:

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Origins Pinwheel Top is Finished – design process for border

Flag for boston

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And here’s a few of my faves!

A fun chair at my little sewing station

A large string quilt in progress from my friend Maria

Another string quilt at show and tell

These are fun monsters that Ellen of Handmade3d makes for comic con shows and such that she vends at. She does tons of Dr. Who creations! Aren’t they cute? She has an Etsy shop too.

Olivia finished the top for a new pillow she’s working on

Elizabeth gave us a preview of a new queen size bed quilt that she’s working on

Flags for Boston!

Mine is the heart with the dots

All strung together!

It was a really fun afternoon all told. I’m starting a new quilt with my Robert Kaufman Poseidon fat quarter bundle. Right now I’m working on churning out tons of 2″ half-square triangle units using my fast and accurate foundation pieced method.

Hoping tomorrow will be productive too. Maybe I’ll even get a podcast episode out!

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First up is a lace edged heart from Big Dreams Embroidery. This will become my flag contribution for Flags for Boston that the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild is organizing. They have some suggested guidelines. I’m keeping mine simple with just the heart as the centerpiece. I wish i’d used a contrasting thread for the lace edge but oh well, what’s done is done. Isn’t the dot fabric cute?

The turquoise thread was part of my May Aurifil Thread Club shipment from The Quilt Bear! It fit perfectly with the fabric. I think this month is my favorite so far.

Next on my embroidery machine is a fun design I just found of a Totoro! I’m a huge fan of the Japanese anime director Miyazaki and I think his film My Neighbor Totoro is my favorite with Spirited Away being a close second. I have some other Totoro stuff and I’m trying to expand my collection. This will be the centerpiece of a pillow I think. Download the free totoro design here.

Lastly, a little tip for your sewing room! In my recent move I got tired of chasing my foot pedal around on the floor. I don’t have carpeting so it goes all over the place. I remembered I had some shelf liner that’s rubberized and decided to use a bit of that under the pedal. I put a bit of masking tape to secure it to the pedal. No more chasing it down! It stays put now.

Have a great quilty weekend!

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