Coin Toss is a bed quilt – too big, really, for my full size bed, but that hasn’t stopped me from using it. It’s six and a half feet wide and eight feet long (80″ x 96″, or 203cm x 244cm) and I love it. It was an incredibly easy quilt, perfect as a stash buster, and I finished the top in about three days. It sat on the quilting frame for 6 months. I finished quilting it on Christmas Day, and hand sewed the last of the binding at 12:50 am on New Year’s Day. Here are far too many photos:

As soon as I hung it over the quilting frame, the cats headed into their fort…

…but Buttercup had to come out and look at the front.

As I quilted it, I wrote words that had special meaning to me. Here are a few:

Christmas 2011

Laugh

Accept

Joy

Breathe!

Peace

Obstinance

Tradition

Family

Courage

Yes...

… I do wear white cotton socks and Birkenstocks…

As I was quilting, my aunt noticed I was writing things and asked me about it. I was making a pass from right to left at that point, and I told her I could write something backward. She laughed – and I wrote “backward” – backward. Mirror image.

Backward, backward

Here’s the back of the quilt, where you can see “backward” forward.

Backward, forward

And here’s the entire back of the quilt. Because if I have to piece the backing, I’m going to piece the backing.

As for the start, we pulled fabrics for the Birds in the Air quilt.

Mom is sewing the first of the 672 HST units.

There are several different ways to foundation piece. Check out Jeanne’s post on foundation piecing with regular paper. If you decide that foundation piecing is your new favorite method, also check out a fantastic book called The Expert’s Guide to Foundation Piecing. It contains variations on foundation piecing from fourteen different quilters, all putting their own spin on the process.

Foundation piecing comes in many forms. Any block where you sew fabric to a piece of paper or other fabric used as a stabilizer is foundation piecing. String quilts, crazy quilts and even some log cabins are foundation pieced. If you see an antique log cabin quilt with teeny tiny quarter-inch logs, it was foundation pieced. Many quilts were pieced to use up every scrap of fabric, and those scraps were often cut on the bias, or were so small that it was difficult to piece with them. By sewing the scraps to a foundation, you created stability and allowed smaller pieces to be used. Foundations can be used to create geometric designs, as in the Crossed Kayaks mini quilt above, or to create “pictures” as in the flower mini quilt below.

Paper is the most common foundation today, whether it’s regular copy paper, special foundation paper made to go through a printer, or leftover newsprint. If you can get your hands on unprinted newspaper paper (?!) I hear that’s fantastic for foundation piecing.

Another option, and my preference, is freezer paper. With regular paper you sew through the paper, which is more stabilizing but also means that you have to print, copy or draw a separate foundation for every block or component you make. With the freezer paper method, you fold the paper back and sew along the fold. Because you never sew the fabric directly onto the paper, you can peel off the foundation and use it again and again.

I first saw this method on an episode of Simply Quilts (a show that unfortunately is no longer airing on television). Judy Mathieson demonstrated a Mariner’s Compass block using this technique, and I immediately had to go try it. This was my first experience with foundation piecing, and it’s still my favorite.

Create Your Foundation

First you need to get your design onto your foundation. I use freezer paper sheets that are made to go through your inkjet (NOT laser because of the heat) printer, such as Quilter’s Freezer Paper Sheets from C&T Publishing or C. Jenkins Freezer Paper Sheets. You can find it at some quilt shops or JoAnn Fabrics, or you can buy it online. Sometimes the design is too big to fit onto 8 1/2″ x 11″ paper, so I’ll draw it on regular freezer paper. For now, print it on regular paper and trace it onto regular freezer paper. If you like the method you can look into other options later.

Scale

Regardless of the foundation you use, most foundation piecing (except string or crazy quilts) requires you to first print, draw or copy the design onto the foundation. It is absolutely essential that you do this at the correct scale! If you print it from a PDF, make sure that the Page Scaling is set to None (it might default to Fit to Printer Margins – this is wrong). You’ll see this option in the Print window.

Some patterns have a 1″ test box right on the pattern. After printing or copying, measure this to be sure it’s still exactly one inch. Don’t skip measuring it. Trust me, you’ll regret it eventually.

Sections

Simple foundation pieced designs can be created with a single foundation, but sometimes you need to join multiple sections together to create the finished block. For example, this block can be made from one foundation:

While this block requires two separate sections that are joined together later:

When I print the foundations from EQ7, it automatically numbers the segments so I know what order to add fabrics. There’s room for a little change on some blocks, but some must be done in the exact order shown. Here’s the first, single foundation block with numbering:

Here’s the second, two-piece foundation with numbering:

Notice how this one has two separate sections, one numbered A1, A2, etc. and the other B1, B2, etc. (You may need to click it to view it larger.) Also, it shows the quarter inch seam allowance for the outer edges. You can see where you would cut the foundations apart for individual piecing.

By the way, these are screenshots, NOT accurate foundation patterns. You do not want to print the photos and try piecing them because scale and sizing may be off. If you want to try either of these, here are downloadable PDFs for 6″ blocks:

Foundation T Block PDF

Foundation 2 Piece Block PDF

They’re not “real” blocks, just things I sketched up quickly to illustrate the points. Although the second one does make kind of an interesting pattern when blocks are rotated:

Freezer Paper Method

Once you’ve printed or traced your foundation onto freezer paper, trim the excess paper away. It’s okay to leave a little extra around the edges, but you don’t want a lot of paper getting in your way.

Next, crease the fold lines – the “sewing” lines. The best way is with a paper or rotary cutter with a scoring blade, which looks like a regular rotary blade but has a dull edge. An old pizza cutter would probably work. You can also use the edge of your acrylic ruler – place it flat with the edge along the line, pull the paper up along the edge, and use your fingernail to crease along the underside of the paper. Remove the ruler and fold it the rest of the way over, creasing to make it sharp. Having a sharp edge makes the fold crisper and more accurate.

Repeat with all of the fold lines (not the outside edge).

Some people like to cut their fabrics into the approximate shapes they need, only slightly larger. Sometimes I do that, as in my Icicles quilt, but mostly I just grab a scrap and go. Choose your first piece of fabric and iron the freezer paper to the WRONG side of the fabric so it covers the entire section plus about 1/4″ all the way around. In the photo below, I’m placing fabric for the tumbler shaped piece in the center. (This method works best if you have an iron right next to your sewing machine so you don’t have to get up every time you sew a new piece on.)

A strong light, a light box or a window are all helpful because you need to see both the lines on the paper and the fabric placement through the paper.

Some people prefer to trim after sewing the seam, but I like to do it before. Fold the paper back along the crease to reveal the excess fabric. Use a rotary cutter and ruler to trim 1/4″ beyond the edge of the paper.

You can also use scissors if you like – the seam line is determined by the foundation, so it doesn’t have to be a perfect 1/4″.

Place the second piece of fabric right sides together with the piece ironed to the foundation. If possible, line up the straight edge of the new fabric with the edge that you just trimmed. With the foundation still folded back, make sure the new fabric completely covers the area on the foundation. Here you can see green lines that show the edges of the new piece of fabric. There is a lot of extra space on the left, but the right side is very close to the line. There was just barely enough room – I should have moved the fabric to the right before sewing.

Sew along the edge of the foundation, as close as you can without perforating the paper.

Flip the fabric and the paper back into place and check that the fabric covers the area. Do this BEFORE you iron it in place and trim it! The green arrows show the corners of the section – remember, you need 1/4″ extra fabric all the way around the section. I cut it very close.

Press to adhere the fabric to the freezer paper, fold back the next section, and repeat. Continue until the block is complete. It doesn’t look all that nice at first – there’s a lot of excess fabric.

You can see the darker square around the outside of the block that indicates the sewing line, with a lighter cutting line 1/4″ outside of that. Use your rotary cutter and ruler to trim on the outer cutting lines. Be careful – it’s easy to accidentally cut on the wrong line! Also, since you’re cutting through paper, don’t use a cutter with a brand new blade if you can avoid it.

After you’ve trimmed it you can peel the freezer paper off and use it again!

If you’re doing a block with multiple pieces, leave the freezer paper on and fold back the 1/4″ seams, then use the paper as a guide when sewing the two pieces together.

So that’s freezer paper foundation piecing! Any questions? Do you have another way of doing it that you’d like to share?

If you’d like to practice a few different, but fairly basic, foundation pieced blocks, check out the series of heart blocks on my Patterns page. When you’re feeling really adventurous, try the cow! There’s also a short PDF of an earlier version a Freezer Paper Piecing tutorial.

In the meantime, this is the next project that Mom and I will be working on:

There’s a story behind this. It will almost certainly be a raffle prize in a fundraiser on behalf of my uncle, who is dealing with a rare form of cancer. He is a hunter who trains bird dogs, and is active in the local bird hunting community. Hunting friends approached him about doing a fundraiser hunt and he suggested that they raise money for a local cancer support organization instead, since he didn’t need the financial assistance. Mom and I volunteered to make a quilt for the raffle that will be part of the event, and this is what I came up with.

I knew from the beginning I was going to use the Birds in the Air block. What else could I use? I also wanted to use the Barn Raising setting, which is the diamonds formed by the gold blocks. A Barn Raising is a traditional event where a community comes together to build (or “raise”) a barn for one of its members. Community coming together to help? Most definitely. The Barn Raising portion is a little off center because, well, so is my uncle. The gold color represents the fields where they hunt. The blue section is the dogs and hunters approaching the hunt area, and the green, red and gold in the corners are the birds flying away as they’re flushed.

This is a generous bed sized quilt, about 85″ x 97″ (220 cm x 250 cm). It’s made entirely of half square triangles – 2,240 of them, to be exact. The small triangle units finish at 2″, and the block is 6″. That is 672 half square triangle units, plus 672 small half square triangles, plus 224 large half square triangles. But who’s counting.

We’ll use Triangle Papers to construct the HST units, but the rest of the triangles will have to be cut and sewn individually. I’ll be honest – most likely Mom will be doing the majority of the sewing on this. She is retired and has the free time, and I’m still (happily) working on the Double Wedding Ring. I have a goal to finish it before the next Stitch & Bitch on February 11, just two weeks away. The Birds in the Air quilt needs to be finished by early March, so we have some time.

I have to say one more time how much I love EQ7. As I mentioned, I knew it was going to be a Birds in the Air block, and I had the Barn Raising setting in mind. I started rotating blocks in EQ7, building the diamonds, and when I got through the fourth ring I thought, “I kind of like the way it looks with some of the blocks unrotated.” I looked at the space at the bottom left and wondered what other patterns would happen if I rotated blocks differently. After just a few minutes of playing around, the squares developed. I built a sort of fence around that section to define it further, then started playing with colors. All in all, even including changing the colors in each individual block (two clicks per block – one for the black prints, one for the color), it took me less than 30 minutes start to finish to design the quilt. I attribute the design partly to serendipity, partly to the pure dumb luck that I was able to recognize an interesting pattern when it appeared in front of me, and partly to the ease with which you can change things in EQ7.

Seriously, go get this book. (Click on the image above to read about it.) It’s available for Kindle for just $12.99, or you can do like I did and order an autographed copy AND buy the Kindle version. Because I want to read it NOW and I want a hardcover to add to the collection on the shelf.

So the funny part is, I managed this all by myself. Think about it – how do you hold a camera to record a video, and use both hands for the demonstration? Answer: You find the last remaining wire coat hanger in the house and bend it into an odd shape that both fits over your head so it hangs around your neck AND holds the camera in exactly the right position. Well, I’m nothing if not resourceful. I also created a YouTube account and uploaded a video for the first time. Isn’t that… thpecial?

Instead, I offer this photo:

Yes, I started working on the Double Wedding Ring again. I finally figured out what works for me for curved piecing, and since – FOR ME – it is completely pin-less, I made a lot of progress this weekend. I have to make 16 more footballs, which will take about an hour. The top row is completely assembled and the second row is mostly assembled, but needs to be attached to the top row. I got that far then decided I needed to lay it all out to be sure the distribution of fabrics looked good. I’m pretty happy with it so far. I’ve had a few “let it go” moments, and some seam intersections don’t line up as neatly as I’d like, but I’m trying to take a deep breath and move on.

I cut this using the Accuquilt Go Double Wedding Ring dies, and I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, it’s very fast to cut and the little notches make it easy to line up the pieces. On the other, it just doesn’t go together well once you start assembling the footballs. Most (though not all) Double Wedding Ring templates have corner pieces with curved edges, but this one uses squares. I do a pretty good job with my quarter inch seams, and yet the footballs (aka melons) have, without exception, turned out either ruffly or with a puffy center. We also had trouble with one of the dies bending during the cutting process. It was replaced by the vendor, but the second die bent in the exact same place. I still think the AccuQuilt Go is a great tool for certain applications, but it’s far from perfect.

Anyway, I’m hoping to finish the top in the next couple of weeks. As long as the forward momentum continues, that’s a strong possibility.

I’ve also made very slight progress on the Dear Jane quilt. I completed three blocks – simple blocks, and they were cut out several months ago, but progress is progress.

In case you don’t remember, this is what it will eventually look like. (Whether it’s finished in my lifetime is another question.)

And for the gratuitous cat photo, here’s Buttercup sleeping on top of the entertainment center. When the fireplace is on, she goes to high ground and then melts into a boneless puddle. I couldn’t actually see anything but her ears because she’s so high up. I held the camera up and took several blind shots to get this:

http://www.quilterssurvey.com/

The survey will only be available until January 30, and there are some big ticket prizes available.

Of course, I hate to follow patterns. Applique isn’t really my thing, either. As I looked at the photo in the magazine, I realized that one relatively small design element increased the difficulty level, and with a teeny little change, almost unnoticeable in the finished design, it became a much easier project.

In the process, I did some searching to try to find if there was a traditional block in this design. I found a block from 1936 that is almost identical to Granny’s Stars, called Arrowhead.

Here’s an EQ7 illustration of Granny’s Stars:

And an illustration of Arrowhead:

And an illustration of my slightly revised block:

Side by side – see the differences?

This variation allows you to use the basic components Jeanne and I have covered so far in the Skill Builder Series to create the block. If you can make a nine patch, flying geese, and quarter square triangles, you can do this block. If I had to put a skill level to it, I’d call it Adventurous Beginner.

We decided this quilt would look good scrappy, and we chose colors based on what we thought the recipient would like. Here’s an illustration of the whole quilt in the chosen colorway:

It’s pretty traditional, but the large (16″) block could easily accommodate more contemporary fabrics. Here are some illustrations:

Mom’s working away at this – here are her blocks so far:

It’s very difficult to take photos of items on the design wall. Here’s why:

Yep, we have a design “wall-way.” (Get it? Wall + Hallway? I crack myself up.) And you may recognize these blocks –

I actually have nearly all of the blocks done so far for the Test Your Skills Sampler. I have to make two more and then I’ll be caught up. Funny that I’m behind on making blocks for MY OWN quilt along. This weekend I made 21 blocks. Yep, I was that far behind. Not good.

Did you get any fabulous Black Friday deals? My mom braved the crowd at JoAnn Fabrics and scored this full roll of Warm & Natural batting.

It’s regularly $520 (that’s 40 yards at $13 a yard!), but she had a 50% off coupon, plus a 20% off your total purchase coupon (or was it 25%?), so she paid about $200.

As you can see at the bottom, Buttercup thinks it’s a giant scratching post, which annoys me to no end. I need to put it up, or at least wrap something around it. In the meantime, she also uses it as a place to nap…

…and a step toward the top of the bookshelf – and the toy mousie residing there!

Isn’t she ‘dorable?

I know, that cat has me wrapped around her extra toes.