Things I'm Learning About English Paper Piecing

I've posted previously about my Grandmother's Flower Garden project here and here. And I've been learning things! Little tricks that make English Paper Piecing easier.

1. Needles Matter

Ever since SisterStitches gave me my first packet of Clover Black Gold needles, I've loved them! I use the quilting needles for quilting (of course!), and the applique/sharps for any intricate hand work. I can't say enough about these needles. They are very fine, and very sharp. When you don't want your stitches to show, as in hand piecing or appliqué, these are the needles to use.

2. Pressing

I press a lot when doing this kind of work. Of course, I press any wrinkles out of the fabric to begin with. That simply makes them easier to handle.

Then I press after I have basted the fabric pieces to the papers. At first I was using a dry iron, but lately I've been using Mary Ellen's Best Press. I like the nice sharp, crisp edges I get on the hexagons. This should lead to better accuracy when sewing two hexagons together.

Ed. 3/20/18  If you are using the glue method to baste, I'm not sure if I would press afterwards or not.  It might make the glue more permanent, that's my fear.  And it may not be as necessary.  But I really like pressing when I'm using thread to baste.

And I also press a section when it is all sewn together, and before I remove any of the papers.

3. Pinning the paper to the fabric

I'm not sure where I read this, but it helps things a lot to pin the fabric hexagon to the paper prior to basting. That keeps the edges a little more even on the back side, making sure that I stay centered on the paper.

4. A small binder clip for holding the hexagons together

This is a great idea! I use a small binder clip to hold together the two hexagons that I am sewing at the moment. As you can see in the photo above, I was able to put this clip off to the side, holding the shapes together and leaving my entire seam open to sewing. Sometimes, however, the clip goes part way on top of the seam I'm sewing. I simply remove it when I get to that point.

5. Thread

Another love I have is for very fine thread. Here is my collection of threads I keep in my English Paper Piecing bag. They are all either Bottom Line by Libby Lehman, or So Fine!, both by Superior Threads. The Bottom Line is a 60 weight thread, and the So Fine! that I'm using is a 50 weight. If your thread takes up less space, presumably you can get a more accurate seam. It does tend to tangle if the tail is left too long, so I have to work with a "tidy" amount of thread.

6. Template for cutting

SisterStitches gave me this idea, which is to cut a plastic template with the seam allowances added for drawing the fabric shapes. Some people simply use a square of fabric to baste to the papers. But I like the neatness of having a hexagonal piece of fabric to baste to a hexagonal piece of paper. The beauty is that you can make the template the size of your paper hexagon plus the "seam allowance" amount that gets folded over and basted to the back of the paper. At first I used a template that added 1/4" to my paper size. But I soon cut another template that had 3/8" added. That gives me a little more fabric to hang onto when I'm basting the fabric to the paper.

Also, an indelible pen is a must. I once tried a ball point pen, which totally messed up my plastic template. And any ink that is not permanent could bleed when it gets sprayed and ironed.

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Maybe I'll figure out some more good tricks as I go along. If you have any tricks or tips to share with me, please let me know!

Housebound

I'm finally starting to feel better. I've been sick with a cold and sore throat for the past nine days. Sniffly, sore throat, runny nose, achy, coughing, generally feeling very yucky. It really hit me hard, and I've been pretty much glued to the sofa for the past week.

It has not been much fun, but I won't complain about it, as I know everyone has gone through this. The worst part is that I missed my guild's annual quilt retreat. That is three days when we go out of town, stay in a motel there, and sew to our heart's content in a conference room which we turn into a sewing "factory." No cooking, no housework, no making beds. It's always so much fun, and a time to get a lot of sewing done. One of my favorite parts is seeing everyone else's projects. So that was a big bummer, to miss that.

The good news is that I survived (!) and MisterStitches took good care of me. KittyStitches actually had the nerve to enjoy my being sick, as I generally had a lap for her.

I was able to do some things, though. I read a lot, and I did a lot of hand sewing. I recently showed you the hexagon Grandmother's Flower Garden designs I'm working on here. When I started these, I was brand new to it, and wasn't sure I wanted to sign up for a whole quilt. But I needed some kind of a project.

So I joined two flowers together with a ring around them, then added another ring all the way around that. I filled in the corners a little bit until it was about the size of a placemat. My plan is to quilt this, then trim it up and bind it into a placemat.

Here you can see three of the placemat shapes I've done. In the photo just above I've removed papers from some of the green hexagons, but not all of them. That's why it looks like there are two different colors of green. I've actually completed four placemat tops, and am close to done with number five. I love sewing these little hexagons together!

Now I'll tell you what I've been reading.

First of all, I finished reading Vanity Fair, which had taken me a very long time to read, since it's such a big book. Really. Big. Book. 1800's England, society, family life, society, hierarchies, society.

Then I picked up Sarah's Key, which I had bought a few weeks ago. I was so glad to have finished Vanity Fair so I could get on to reading another book! Sarah's Key is a great book, very moving. It went back and forth between present-day New York/Paris and Paris under Nazi occupation. I highly recommend it.

And just today I picked up this little book and read it through. Heaven is for Real is the true story of a 4-year-old boy who almost died with a burst appendix. After his recovery, he starts talking about seeing God and visiting heaven, with amazing detail for a child that young. It's very interesting, too.

Grandmother's Flower Garden

Ever since I finished hand-piecing my tumbling blocks quilt, I have felt the need for a hand-sewing project. I've managed to keep myself busy on long car trips with some embroidery projects, and other small things, but I needed something else. SisterStitches has done quite a bit of English Paper Piecing, and recommended it to me, so I finally decided to try my hand at it.

First I bought a package of hexagon papers (actually, they're card stock). I chose to use 1 1/4" hexagons. That is the measurement of one of the sides, not the width of the whole piece.

I think it was SisterStitches who suggested that I make a plastic template to cut out my fabric pieces. I started with one that was 1/4" larger than my paper template, to allow for the fabric that gets folded over the edge. Then I decided to give myself a little more fabric, and made a second template that added 3/8". I like that size much better.

Here you can see that I've traced my shapes onto the fabric. (Note: it's best to iron your fabric at some point!) Having that template really made this part easy.

This photo shows seven hexagons which have had the fabric basted to the paper pieces. (Yes, I know I'm switching fabrics on you with these pictures; please excuse me!) They are now ready to be sewn together into a "flower."

The back side of one "flower" all sewn together. . .

. . . and the front side of that same flower.

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And that brings me to show you this beautiful quilt. My GrandmaStitches made this for a wedding present for MisterStitches and myself. That was 35 years ago. Hand pieced and hand quilted, of course. I dug it out of the cedar chest to admire it, and then felt bad for keeping it put away like that.

So now it lives on our sofa, and we use it to cover up with while we're watching a movie in the evening.

A beautiful quilt like this should be kept out and admired, don't you think?

I think I can almost remember some of these fabrics as Grandma's dresses.