Week 17 EPP - Pennsylvania Dutch Magic

Picture books are a great "read" when I'm tired or can't concentrate. This book has been around the house for decades - I bought it when there was a vogue for painting furniture back in the eighties. Remember Jocasta Innes, anyone?  It's a Dover book and like all their publications the images in it are copyright free. 

My attention was caught because the circular motifs are called hex symbols - although it's apparently nothing to do with hexagons, but rather some kind of folk-magic talisman.  Anyhow I thought my project needed another circle shape  - so much the better if it comes with a little magic.  And coffee.  Lots.

I put this together in the same way as the last one - using polar graph paper.  Here's the finished block:

There are 41 pieces in this seven inch circle.  It might be quite dramatic as a really huge single block quilt - certainly it would be easier to handle. I now have the five star / pentagon / medallion blocks I need for my layout.   Next week I should really concentrate on up-sizing my other EPP pieces to a 12 inch block.

Thank you for your comments on the birthday cake - who knows, I may have this project finished by this blog's second birthday.

My total pieces so far add up to 864.  I'm linking up with the Monday Morning Star Count at Life Under Quilts, and at the Small Blog Meet at Lily's Quilts. 

Fabrics:
          Dark blues - both Sevenberry, not sure of names.
          Pale grey - Botanics - Leaves
          Pale Solid - Moda Bella - Porcelain
          Red - Riley Blake - Sasparilla

Happy Birthday Blue Moth

Blue Moth is one year old today!  Pincushion cake anyone?

Week 16 EPP - Curves

There is no reason on earth not to use EPP for curves, as long as they are gentle.  I decided to try it after looking at OPQuilt  - Elizabeth has started an interesting monthly QAL of EPP circles. Here's my finished block, which is about seven inches across the circle:

  

  

Not being too good at using a compass, I downloaded Polar Graph Paper from a great free website called Incompetech.   As well as Polar graph paper you can get hexagons, triangles and other stuff here.  You can fiddle around with the settings (colour, line width, number of radii etc).  Useful for foundation piecing as well as EPP.  I just went with the default settings and my circles fitted neatly onto an A4 page. 

I drew my design onto the graph paper and numbered the pieces.

Work in progress.  I found it helped to cut the fabric on the bias where the curve was concave.

..and the back.

I kept the paper pieces in while I did the appliqué, thinking it might help to keep everything flat.  Then I cut the back out to remove the papers. Not sure if that worked - there are quite a few layers of fabric in places. 

It's a bit crinkly.  But I intend to add more crinkles later on in the quilting.  37 pieces to add to my overall total for this project, so I'm now up to 823 for Jessica's Monday Morning Star Count.

Week 15 EPP - Victorian Tile

This block is based on a Victorian tile from Pinterest.  

The original image was too small and when I blew it up the lines went all fuzzy.  

I drew round the shapes and adapted the design a bit, numbering each piece so I could keep them in the right order. 

I didn't have time to complete the appliqué in time for the Monday Morning Star Count because I had four hours of sitting in a deck chair to get done. And then there was the world cup final.  

I hope to catch up next week when I am going to try curved pieces. (I've said it now, so I'm going to do it.)

This piece has 33 shapes in it, bringing my total to 786.  I will of course be linking up over at Life Under Quilts.  Jessica's link up has helped me - and many others - to keep going with this project.  Thanks, Jessica!

Week 14 EPP - Pentagons

Regular pentagons do not fit together by themselves.  You have to use other shapes to fit them together. 

To make this piece I used an enlarged photocopy from this Dover book...

...and cut out the section I wanted.  I could not be sure that the photocopy was not distorted, so I numbered the pieces and sewed the shapes together in order, starting from the middle.

Here it is part completed shown from the back.  

After I had completed the middle section the shape reminded me so much of the English tudor rose.

The appliqué is slightly wonky - I will have to fix that when I trim the blocks.

I'm still working on enlarging the other pieces and I have three more star shapes to make before I have enough for a 5 ft square quilt.  Now up to 753 pieces overall - I expect I will make 1000 for the finished quilt.  Linking up for the Monday Morning Start Count at Life Under Quilts.