Striped Tabby Cat And Acrylic Painting

Striped Tabby Cat Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

 

 

Thank you so much for visiting me last week and for your lovely comments on my paper piecing.  I have been working on a few different quilting projects simultaneously.  Sometimes I start on one and then get carried away by something else.  I am sure you know the feeling.  I drafted this striped tabby cat quilt pattern months ago.  I was really hoping to finish quilting the mini before showing it here, but alas, that didn’t happen.

 

 

My Orange Maine Coon Cat | Whims And Fancies

 

 

As I mentioned earlier, most of my quilt patterns are derived from different aspects of my life.  This is my orange Maine Coon boy who is my shadow.  He became the model for my mini.

 

 

Striped Tabby Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

 

 

For this special mini I cut into the swirly orange fat quarter that I had saved forever.  I had just enough scraps of the black fabric left from another quilt to use as the background for this one.  The faint gold in that fabric makes me think of magic dust.  I had to add the night sky fabric in the window.  So now my cat and I can sit by the window and cherish each other’s company and the night sky together.

 

 

Striped Tabby Cat Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

 

 

Susie made this pillow from my pattern way before I could finish mine.  I love the vintage look of her kitty.  Her kitty’s name is Tessie!  You can read all about Tessie in Susie’s Post.

 

Hopefully I get to quilt mine soon!  The quilting design is already traced on it and it is basted, but I may have to wait a few more days before I can sit at the machine.

 

 

Trees In Acrylic Paint | Whims And Fancies

 

 

Last week I suddenly got sick with the flu.  When I started feeling a little better, I pulled out the acrylic set that I got during the holidays.  Painting has always been my pastime when I’m sick.  Whenever I can’t go outside, I bring the outside to me with paint.  I love to paint trees.  Last time when we were in the Sierras, we saw a lot of trees dying due to the draught we are facing in California.  They look like fall colours, but sadly they are dried leaves on dying trees.  The orange in the painting depicts those leaves.

Although I hadn’t used acrylic before, I learned a lot about acrylic painting just from this small sketch.  The Liquitex Basics set I got has 48 tubes.  It is perfect for trying out colours before purchasing better quality versions of the colours that I really like.  I highly recommend the set for anyone who is interested in trying out acrylic painting.  I can’t wait to play more with mine.

 

-Soma

 

 

 

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Pattern Writing Series – Paper Piecing

Violin Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

Before I start talking about anything else, I want to thank everyone for linking up on Wandering Camera and leaving such wonderful comments.  It was a great start to the monthly linky party and I really appreciate it.

As you know, I love making pictures into quilts.  The design ideas come from all aspects of my life.  For example, I started making the music instruments patterns with this violin because I play the violin.

When I started in 2012, I didn’t know a thing about quilting.  I had seen pictorial blocks made using foundation/paper piecing and I really wanted to make them.  I was addicted and I became a paper piecing designer.

 

 

When Cheryl started the Pattern Writing Series at Meadow Mist Designs, I was going to write a few lines about paper piecing as part of the weekly round table discussion.  As I started writing I found out that there are quite a few reasons why I prefer paper piecing over regular piecing.   Cheryl and I thought it would be great to write a post about it with a few examples.

 

First and foremost, PP gives me the freedom of turning any picture I wish to make into a quilt block. A lot of the times, I don’t see the designs I really want depicted in fabrics. I can make my custom “fabrics”, if you will, using this technique.

Raindrops On Flowers is the first set of stained-glass-inspired designs I made depicting the flowers of the United Kingdom.

 

Squares Plus Quilt Pattern | Whims And FanciesI am not the world’s most patient person when it comes to repetitive processes.  I simply lose patience when I have to repeatedly cut all the pieces ahead of time. I want to get to sewing as fast as I can.  If you are like me, you might also find PP advantageous.

Although I included the instructions for both regular AND paper piecing in my new pattern Squares Plus, you can be sure that I will be using the PP method for my quilt.

 

Nordic Star Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

Cutting all the pieces ahead of time seems very daunting to me. If I repeat a mistake while cutting my fabrics, then I have wasted a lot of fabric and I have to repeat the process. With PP I can cut and sew as I go. If I make a mistake, then I have wasted only a little.

I added a lot of colour variations in my Twilight Star quilt layout.  The fabrics I picked for this quilt are out of production, so I rather make the blocks one at a time to avoid repeating cutting mistakes.

 

Purple Star Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

On a side note, I hear a lot of times that PP wastes a lot of fabric. With time and practice, you can actually minimize waste down to just trims. If I am going to make multiple blocks from a pattern, I usually print an extra copy of the pattern. I cut the pieces out and use them as templates to cut my fabric.  That is how I made this quilt.

 

Flying Geese And Star Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

It is easier to sew complex patterns by converting them to PP patterns. Following numbers and letters is very much like painting by numbers.  I enjoy the challenge of trying to define shapes with minimum amount of seam alignment to make it easier to sew for myself or anyone else making the block.

It was fun to design the star block with flying geese on this Geese Around The Sun wall hanging.

 

Camera Quilt Pattern | Whims and Fancies

I like PP over appliqué because there are no raw edges with PP. I also don’t have to pseudo-FMQ to sew the appliqué pieces. Straight line sewing is all I need.

This travel bag gets roughed up quite a lot and goes though a lot of washing, so raw edges was not an option.  Even though I have another pattern that uses an appliqué lens, I used the PP version for my bag.

 

Greek Letters Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

Curves are quite easy to replicate with PP even though they are made of straight lines.  All the script letters in my To Hellenikon quilt are made using paper piecing.

 

Pinwheel Quilt Pattern | Whims And Fancies

This last one is a big one for me. With PP I can get crisp and perfect corners and lines every time. You don’t have to be efficient with scant quarter inch seam. If you can sew on the line, you will get a perfect block every time.

My HST-s always come up a little smaller than the correct size.  In my new WIP I chose to use PP on this simple block because I didn’t want to worry about scant quarter inch seam every time to get the right size.

 

There you have it!  Paper piecing is how and why I started quilting and it will always be my first preference.  There are limitless possibilities with paper piecing and I really cherish it.

Many Thanks to Cheryl for including me in the Pattern Writing Series and letting me write this post.  I enjoyed sharing this with you. Please visit Meadow Mist Designs for more insight into pattern writing, Cheryl is doing a wonderful job with it.

Happy Quilting,
-Soma

 

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