July 30th, 2010

Recognize this guy?

When I was a little girl, a long, long, time ago, I remember this statue of the mythological lumberjack, Paul Bunyan.

And I thought he was HUGE.

On my trip to Bemidji a few years back, I went to visit Mr. Bunyan again.

Although he is very large, he just didn’t measure up to my childhood image of GIGANTIC.

Funny how some things that we remember as kids just aren’t as large as our memories make them out to be.

Elisa

July 26th, 2010

New pattern!!!!

Yippee. I love it when everything if finally complete.

The bag idea was born. Many practice samples were made.

Wrote the directions. Made product sample from directions.

Edit and make again (and again).

Test… Proof… Photograph… Edit… Graphic layout…

Finally… to the printer.

And then…. whew! finally the finished product is ready to go. I hope you like it!. (Baby not included)

Check out on my newly designed website. on the new patterns page.

My redesign on my website was done by Holly Knott. And I love it.
It has a lot more buttons.
You can follow me on twitter.
My facebook page.
Or come back here to my blog.
Exciting stuff!

July 13th, 2010

Spring Market was in May and I am still working on all of the commitments that I made.

I do have a tendency to over commit. (No not me!)

Robert Kaufman fabrics sent me fabric from a new line beautiful batik fabrics that will be coming out soon. They wanted me to remake my Bright Star quilt pattern in their upcoming line. This pattern has two blocks, the Log block and the Flower block that are paper or foundation pieced and then my 6″ Quick Curves template is used..

They sent me the entire line of fabric and I then had to choose which colors to use. I narrowed it down to these fabrics. You can see the pattern cover in front of the fabrics.

I sorted the fabrics into color groups. Once I have all of the greens, yellows, blues, et cetera, into groups I sort them from darker to lighter. This helps me narrow down the choices and gives me some organization. I do say some, because it can take me a long time to find the right fit. I am looking for enough contrast so that the fabrics show up but not so much that any one color jumps out.
But depending on the look that you want, a lot of contrast can be a good thing. It can depend on how you want the finished project to look.

I tjem print out copies of the blocks that I will be making and cut little pieces of fabric and paste them on the test blocks to see how they colors look together. I made about three test blocks of the Log block, but it took me about 10 test blocks of the Flower block to find the look that I wanted.

After making my decision on the fabric choices I sew one of each block.

Only after I have sewn a test block and decide that I like it, do I then cut the remainder of the fabric for the rest of the quilt. Even then, it can still be a surprise when I put all of the blocks together to see the finished project.

I completed the top and sent it away to be quilted. I look forward to posting a photo when I receive one of the finished project.
Yummy batiks!

Elisa

July 5th, 2010

3 1/2″ Drunkards Path from Elisa Wilson on Vimeo.

Excellent instruction and tips on cutting the 3 1/2″ Small Paths template. Elisa shows you how to cut, sew and use these small blocks in a detailed demonstration showing you a quick and easy table runner project.