It feels like I've been doing a lot of FAST sewing lately. My BERNINA L890 has been getting a lot of mileage (literally), and my brain asked if I could please sloooooowwww dooooowwwwn for a bit.
I'm happy to oblige - especially when slowing down means bringing out my English Paper Piecing supplies. I'm obsessed with Liberty prints, so they're the perfect partner when I paper piece - since that's slow, hand-stitching around paper templates. It's perfect for curling up on the couch or in your bed with a Netflix binge, and it's also great to take with you - I've pieced so many of these blocks on airplanes. Handy for all of these FAST trips!
The project I'm working on now is happy to be fit in between other things. I can pick it up and put it down as needed. I'm piecing these amazing shapes in color families (the fans are foundation paper pieced on a machine) and then appliqueing them to large white blocks. There are other fans that will connect together and go in the corners where blocks meet, but for now I'm working through the center of each block.
As much of a hand-stitching purist as I can be, I'm IN LOVE with machine applique on my hand-stitched blocks. I have found YET ANOTHER way the precision laser on my BERNINA 790 Pro is saving my bacon. As you can see if you zoom in, I am not the most precision piecer there ever was, even though with the hand-stitched blocks you have a little more fudge-capability.
Using the laser, I'm able to applique EXACTLY where I want and not go driving off into the background field - which is really important on lawn since it's not got nearly as much body to hold up to random misplaced stitches as a quilting cotton.
The machine not only tells me exactly where I'm about to go, there's a corresponding dot on the stitch pattern on the screen so I know which part of the stitch is going to be that dot - no more getting lost and thinking you were lined up for the blanket stitch edge when actually the needle's about to drop on one of the "legs." Argh!
I only had a quick minute at the machine to stitch one of these down, so I took a quick picture of my stitch settings (if I try to write it down, guaranteed I won't remember what my shorthand meant), and headed back to the grind.
I'm currently piecing the yellow family block, and once all twelve are done I'll be packing it up and bringing it in to Pine Needles for someone who knows how to longarm to handle. This one is going to be a DREAM, and I am not too proud to admit I'm not the person for the quilting!
Happy Sewing to All!
Keely