Boulder Big Time

Objects of my affection

I shipped my quilts to Boulder and reunited with them and my former editor Darra Williamson on the set of  The Quilt Show 

 Photos by Gregory Case Photography

Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims explored techniques from my third book Rotary Cutting Revolution Alex demonstrated my Pineapple CuttingLines™ Pattern. Stay tuned to see what held our attention when this photograph was taken.

Freezer paper 101

Design wall alternative
With only 14 rotary strokes I can cut 64 pineapple patches to size, enough trapezoids and triangles for two Pineapple blocks from two squares of fabric. To make my Two-Color Pineapple Quilt I needed only two different fabrics, Kona Cream and Kona Tomato. All patches are interchangeable whether two colors or more are used.

Hint: I iron the patches to the shiny sides of freezer paper. They remain in place until I peel them off to sew a block. The blocks are conventionally machine pieced, not foundation pieced. The freezer paper can be reused.

Make It Simpler Scrappy Pineapple detail

Pineapples are fabric intensive. A 15" freezer paper mock-up results in a 10" finished block; that's over 60% lost to seam allowances.

Cut it, Sew It, Love It

Launch party at The City Quilter

May 2010

Demo, trunk show and book signing courtesy The City Quilter, New York. Their picture album. I devised an original way to cut 64 trapezoids and triangles for 2 Pineapple blocks from two squares of fabric without measuring, nor waste and using only 14 rotary cuts. One of my eight new techniques. Who's smiling now?  Rotary Cutting Revolution

Tip of the Rotary Iceberg

Made in the shade, with only 2 rotary cuts

There are 26 Tip Boxes in Rotary Cutting Revolution.

This tip from the book leaves many quilters momentarily speechless in workshops. 

To quickly and accurately cut a large square of fabric using a small square ruler:

1. Fold an oversive square of fabric into fourths

2. Cut off raw edges to create a fabric square 1/2 the desired size.

3. Unfold square. Voila, it's the desired size. Gasp.

Pictured: A torn oversize square of fabric approximately 18" was folded into fourths. Now about 9" square it will be trimmed to 8 1/2" square by cutting off  the raw edges (top and right)  Unfolded, it will be 17" square.

Be there and be square with less space, Make It Simpler.

The Pineapple is an old Favorite -Eveline Foland, 1931

Timeless and Original

Five Pineapple peeks on the May 2010 publication of my "Rotary Cutting Revolution" 

77" square  Windmill Blades blowing in the wind   Photo courtesy The Quilt Complex

74" square

70" square

I made them 21st century Simpler with my CuttingLines™ pattern
Workshop information

March Madness

Boxes. Goodbye and Hello

March 12, 2009 Quilts headed to Mother C&T, Concord, California

Two weeks later photography samples being boxed up

March 2010, one year later, samples back home.

Within a month, the best boxes in the world should arrive at my doorstep from C&T Publishing. I'm expecting my third book, "Rotary Cutting Revolution: New One-Step Cutting, 8 Quilt Blocks, The Make It Simpler Way®" It's a juicy book brimming with photographs. Very, very juicy.

My No-Waste Windmill

Bordering on track

Big Love  36" square 2010

I love, love, loved using my own cutting technique for this baby quilt. Look at the border. The orientation of the directional fabric was maintained. Nancy Wolff's pooches are upright.

I did not use a specialized ruler. There was no waste in cutting the fabric. No measuring. No Swiss cheese holes in the remaining yardage. My only efforts were pure pleasure: choosing stash fabrics to amuse my great-nephew.

By the way, this Windmill quilt is easier to construct than an ordinary four-patch. Believe it or not, its 36 blocks are square; the corners needn't match up. Happy girl.

But woe is me, I didn't catch a photography error on page 60. The correction is here

My One and Only Two-Color Pineapple

Economy in a new setting

I make bed quilts. I make them my way. In 2004 I figured out how to cut two squares of fabric into 64 trapezoids and triangles to make a pair of ordinary Pineapple blocks.  I do this without measuring. I do it without wasting any fabric. And I do it with only 14 rotary cuts.

Discarded metal kitchen cabinets were mine for the taking. I hauled them onto a dolly which I pushed up the street to my apartment. My building superintendent installed them in my sewing room. Because they are metal, I use magnets to attach quilt blocks to the cabinets' surfaces. It's a New York City design wall where every  space is used to its advantage.

The Road to my Rotary Cutting Revolution

The Old Italian Block

   

Studio Spring 2004

 

January 2005 Quilt videotaped for Simply Quilts

Now my 3rd Book! details

Pre-publication workshops were held at the  Great American Quilt Factory Denver and the The Quilt Crossing Boise, February 2010

Mysterious Scraps of the Self-Mitered Log Cabin

Rocky Road Trip: Denver and Boise Workshops

The Self-Mitered Log Cabin leftovers

These are my leftovers. Others made their own at the February 2010 workshops at the Great American Quilt Factory and the Quilt Crossing.

The Origin of the Self-Mitered Log Cabin

It's About Time 

Show and Tell  New York  1997

Where it all began 

I first began printing geometric block patterns using Electric Quilt software onto onion-skin paper for foundation piecing in the early '90s. Some years later, McCall’s Quilting magazine launched the Basic Realities contest which featured Jinny Beyer fabric.

I entered Reality Check using one of the early patterns. It was karma. Among the prizes I won were a half-dozen books from C&T Publishing. In 2000 I made a miniature version:  "Manhattan Two-Step."

I started the Self-Mitered Log Cabin in 2002 but put aside to write "Make It Simpler Paper Piecing" 2003 and its sequel "Perfect Blocks in Minutes" one year later for C&T Publishing I returned to the S-MLC and published it in" Rotary Cutting Revolution."  You may think you know how I pieced it but I bet you don't. You can't tell by looking at the quilt.

Reality Check 1997

Self-Mitered Log Cabin Block

Self-Mitered Log Cabin top

 

The Self-Mitered Quilt  2002-2008 69" x 81"  (detail)