sewtakeahike

Happy New Year! (and new patterns!)

2016 is here, can you believe it? Happy New Year!

Although I try to keep Christmastime and the days leading up to it pretty low key in our home, December turned out to be a busy month for us. I traveled to Chicago right after Thanksgiving for the Bernina Ambassador Reunion and learned so much about Bernina, their awesome family and several of their machines.

 

 

I have always loved the Bernina brand and I am so thankful to have had that experience. I love Bernina!!

 

 

Then, a few weeks later, we were off to Long Beach for a few days.

 

 

What a great trip that was!

I did a ton of sewing in December and I'll save those project pics for another post!

For now, I'll leave you with a few new patterns I've uploaded into my etsy shop:

Both the Duke block and the Apple Blossom are 9" blocks and they look great together. Here's an example of a quilt layout you could do with those two blocks.

 

 

In fact, I designed the Duke block for my friend Vicky and several of us made this quilt for her and it turned out fabulous!

I'll try not to be a stranger, xo, Penny

 

 

Making Faces with Melissa Averinos

 

 

I fell hard for Melissa's pieced face quilt as I watched her progress on it on Instagram. Then when she posted that it was going to be on display at QuiltCon and she was going to be there as well, I had high hopes of meeting her!

Although our paths didn't cross at QuiltCon, fast forward a couple of months, and after a bit of back and forth, Melissa agreed to come to my house in Colorado for a weekend of teaching and a slumber party with a wonderful group of women I had in mind (she wrote a bit about that process here).

Melissa (and her teaching methods) are brilliantly mindful and thoughtful. I really had no idea what to expect, although I had a few preconceived ideas based on the supply sheet.

The class started with a lesson on face drawing. If you take a look at my before the lesson drawing compared to my after lesson drawing, you will see that her methods are very effective.

 

 

By the time we had practiced our face drawings for a bit, we were all restless to get to work with some fabric. Melissa encouraged us to work on a couple of faces at a time and not get too attached as we worked. I love how this method kept my personal need for perfection in check.

Here is a partial of the progression of one of my faces

 

 

   

I'm still working on redhead, and I'm fortunate that Fozzy hasn't discovered all those pieces on my designboard are not yet tacked down!

 

Here's the other face I started. I've started grid stitching her and will keep you updated as I get further along. 

 

 

I love this photo, it's really uncanny how much everyone's faces resemble the maker in features or personality. And then the proud (as she should be) teacher in the front.

 

Thank you so much Melissa for investing in us, we are so grateful to you and I'm so excited to see where the Making Faces journey takes you! You're an absolute treasure!

xo, Penny

 

Paddleboarding and a winner

 

 

 

I have always loved watersports and am willing to try most anything if it has to do with fun on the water. When I was a kid, my cousin Brenny would take us out on the lake with real jet skis that you could stand up on. We loved when she would call and whisk us away to the lake for a day or two on the weekends. And if we weren't with Brenny, we were lake camping/swimming as my dad was an avid camper/fisherman.

L-man and I have recently picked up a new water activity and we are having so much fun with it. Paddleboarding! We are so excited to travel with them and explore.

If you paddleboard and have any tips for us, we would love to hear!

 

 

 

 

Thank you for all the comments on the Noodlehead style giveaway post! I have chosen a winner and it is Linda M, who said:

"I am always a fan of blue and this one here is nice, but I like the blue with white flowers the best!  Tumble!"

I will send an email to you shortly Linda!

Happy Monday!

xo, Penny

 

Paper Piecing Webinar

 

Today at 11 am Mountain time, I'm presenting a webinar on paper piecing! The webinar will go over basic technique and will give several tips on making paper piecing fun and easy.

Included with the webinar is the flag pattern set you see above for you to practice with.

So please come and join me! But don't worry, if 11 today doesn't fit in your schedule, a link to the webinar will be sent to you for download within a week of today's live event, along with the flag patterns.

You can sign up here, here and here!

 

xo,

Penny

Come join me!

  

I'll be doing a podcast interview with Pat Sloan on American Patchwork and Quilting Radio on Monday April 6 at 4pm Eastern, 3pm Central, 2pm Mountain and 1pm Pacific time! You can either listen live or listen later, it's up to you!

 

 

Either way, I hope you'll join us!