Island Batik Ambassador Challenge: Needle,Paper, Scissors

The Island Batik Ambassador Challenge for the October was called "Needle, Paper, Scissors.  We were tasked to come up with a Paper Piecing Project of any size.  This could be a Foundation or English.

With Fall here and Halloween around the corner, I wanted to make something with that theme included. So I dug into my EQ8 and found some premade Foundation blocks. I came up with a table runner design, and since I have so much Fall colors in my Island Batik stash I decide I would use them in this table runner.

So, I began my quest to remember how to paper piece. I don't usually do a lot of paper pieced projects, so I had to watch a couple of videos and I was off again on my sewing.

It didn't take me long to get the hand of foundation piecing, It really does go quick. With all the pumpkins ready I removed the paper backing and stitched them together, and added the borders to finish it off.

Here is my finished Foundation Pieced Jack O' Lantern table runner, for this fall season.

I so looking forward to starting next months project, we are working on Log Cabin Quilts. I have mine all planned out, just need to get started.

You may want to check out the Paper Pieced projects that the other Island Batik Ambassador made this month. See you in November.

Den Syende Himmel

Busy Hands Quilts

PamelaQuilts

Ark Angel Creations

Desert Bloom Quilting

Freemotion by the River

Yellow Cat Quilt Designs

Quilting Affection Designs 

Inquiring Quilter

Bejeweled Quilts by Barb

Clever Chameleon

Sarah Goer Quilts

Mania for Quilts

Steph Jacobson

Inchworm Fabrics

Kauffman Designs

Moosestash Quilting 

BeaQuilter

Gateway Quilts & Stuff

Carole Lyles Shaw

Sally Manke

Mary Mack Made Mine

Kathleen McMusing

heARTs Creations

Sew Karen-ly Created

If These Threads Could Talk

The Quilt Rambler

Devoted Quilter

Slice of Pi Quilts

Creative Blonde

Vicki's Crafts and Quilting

Masterpiece Quilting

Patterns by Jen

Powered by Quilting

Quilt in a not-Shell

Dizzy Quilter

Curlicue Creations

Lizard Creek Quilts

Little Bunny Quilts

MMM Quilts

Sew Increadibly Crazy

Adventerous Applique and Quilting

Sweetgrass Designs

Living Water Quilter

Whispers of Yore

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Tina

"Designing to Inspire"

Mini-Madness Project

March is here and the Island Batik Ambassadors are busy with the next challenge.  This month’s challenge is to make a foundation or English Paper Piecing project that measures 24” x 24” or smaller.  Foundation and English paper piecing are not my strong points in the quilting word.  I have only made two project before with foundation paper piecing. 

After doing a little research with a couple books and YouTube videos, brushing up on my paper piecing skill, I designed a little Star pattern in EQ7.  Which designing a paper piecing project in EQ7 was new to me also. I had played with it a little last April at EQ Academy, so I knew the basics, but I still needed help from my manual and a couple blogs.  So, you can say this was a great challenge project for me again this year.

After I picked out my fabrics and I prepared the paper sections.  I began sewing the first block just to get a handle of the whole project.  I had to remember with paper piecing you are basically sewing reverse (your project will face down all the time).  I completed the first block with no problems.

One thing, I notice that paper piecing can be time consuming with the sewing, trimming and pinning of the next blocks.  But I noticed you can speed up the process of the assembly by using chain piecing. What a great idea.  I had all the blocks sections done in no time. 

Once I had all the blocks made, I began assembling them together, to make the quilt top and added some borders to finish it off.  I used my Janome 7700 to do all the quilting on the quilt top.  This little quilt measured 19 ½” x 19 ½” finished.

It was a fun challenge this month.  I have learned a lot about paper piecing with this project.  I want to do more this year, I plan to take maybe a few Craftsy class on the subject if time allows.

Do you like paper piecing?  If so, comment below with your favorite tip.

Make sure you check out the other Island Batik Ambassadors projects throughout the coming weeks.

Tina

Island Batiks Ambassadors: Playful Paper Piecing

This month challenge for the Island Batik Ambassadors was Playful Paper Piecing. 

#playfulpaperpiecing #islandbatik

 Paper piecing is one of my weakness, I have only done it once before and I found it to be challenging, mainly due to lack of practice.  With that in mind I looked through the EQ7 library and found some crazy blocks I liked. So I starting to play with colors and came up with the below designed with 7 1/2" blocks.    

Original Design in EQ7

I had rough time getting the first couple pieces sewn together when I started, but after that it seemed to flow surprising well.  After the blocks were completed, I thought it would be fun to play with them a little.  I cut the blocks into 4 pieces and added a thin black sashing piece in the middle. This turned out to be a great touch to the placemats.

My choice of fabrics were 5" strips from the Island Batik Stash Building Package.  Then I added the left over fabric for the borders to get the finished projects.

Finished Placemats

The placements add a little color to our breakfast bar.

Some of our other Ambassadors have finished their challenges projects, be sure to check their playful projects:

Bejeweled Quilts
Kauffman Designs
Moosestash Quilting
Bea Quilter 

FunThread Designs
Stone Cottage Designs