Dusting off my design program

I have had EQ7 for close to 2 years now and I actually have a few projects plugged into it that I'm looking forward to trying out.

But at heart I'm a graph paper and pencil drafter. So I might go months without opening the computer program.

This past week I was compelled to revisit what I had been playing with once upon a time - and I'm glad I did!

Now, I did decide to abandon the pinks and yellows and work in more of a fall/winter palette at this stage. While visiting in Montana earlier this year I picked up a selection of great fabrics from Michele D'Amore for Benartex, Leaf Haven. And they've been sitting up on the shelf waiting for just the right project.

But even before I started working on that version, I started pulling fabrics for a slightly larger version of the same pattern, in cool purples and taupes - a mellow winter feel.

I still have a couple more fabrics to find in order to bring this puppy to fruition, but I am super-psyched to get started on it! And I have to admit, I love feeling super-psyched about new projects again. Love it.

FTLOS Swap gets rolling

About a week ago partner assignments for the second For the Love of Solids modern sewing swap on Flickr were sent out out. They had been eagerly awaited by many, many crafty Flickr users, myself included!

One of the first steps to being a part of one of these virtual swaps is to make up an "inspiration mosaic": a composite of many other craft projects to point your swap partner in the right direction. My mosaic for this particular swap was:

The individual credits for each of these pictures can be found in my Flickr photostream, at this link.

There are apparently a couple of different sources for putting together these mosaics, but I've always had good luck using www.bighugelabs.com.

When the partner assignments go out, the stalking begins! That's the fun part, don't you think?? Gleaning clues about your secret swap partner, their likes, dislikes, desires, what they write in their own blog if it's out there. And thankfully, my partner has plenty of info for me to work from! However, it took me a little while to really get rolling.

I had a couple of days of work in there, then a day with a very specific sewing goal followed by... close to 4 days of being wiped out by some stupid stomach bug!! Dumb flu messing with my fun, stalking design plans! That said, I'm a bit behind in the color gathering stage, but got a chance to pull some pencils together while gazing at my partner's mosaic

and work on a couple of sketches

Tomorrow I'll be back at my studio for the first time in nearly a week, play around with some of the fabrics in my stash, then fill out the palette from Marie's awesome selection of solids at Cool Cottons. That should also give my secret partner plenty of time to chime in on the discussion threads of the Flickr group (some of which she already has... so it *could* still be any of you!). I'll try to keep up on posting progress over the next month or so.

Limited Palette I-Spy

It's been several years since I have made an I-Spy quilt. The fact that my stash of novelty fabrics doesn't seem to have diminished at all recently confirms this. Over the years I've enjoyed putting these guys together, keeping the parents of the recipients in mind as best I can. Here's a little evolution of some of the I-Spys I've done:

(original design by Ami Simms, in her book Picture Play Quilts)

(please excuse the picture quality.... these were done long before I took much care in documenting)

and then a couple of years after that one:

and most recently (for a little tike who is about to turn 2 in just a couple of weeks!):

(another design from the Ami Simms Picture Play Quilts book)

Now, I'm about to start a new quilt, and I've decided I really want to do another log-cabin style I-Spy, but instead of using the whole spectrum of brights out there, I am leaning toward a limited (and rather subdued) palette for this family. I started pulling some focus patches the other day and decided to just get started on a few of the blocks to see if I like where it's going. This is all I have so far, but I think it will work...

I'll be posting more as it develops. Happy Saturday!