Jan 02 11

And The New Year Begins…

My New Year has gotten off to a really nice start, although it was rocky at the outset! We drove 9 hours to arrive in Asheville yesterday evening and when we arrived after dark, our car could not make it through the snow on our driveway! Our home here is on the side of a mountain and the driveway is very long and very steep, and there’s about a 15 foot long section that doesn’t ever get sun, so that snow takes a longer time to melt. Forget that it was about 50 degrees when we arrived last night, that gosh darn snow was still there! We got out of the car and slip/slided our way up to the house and got our trusty snow shovels and shoveled the driveway clear. I have to say, doing this in the dark at 50 degrees was much nicer than doing it in daylight 2 weeks ago at 15 degrees! We got back in the car and made it all the way up and had a nice New Year’s eve together by the fire.

I got busy in my sewing room today and started off by cutting out many yellow and light green petals using Sizzix Die #656672:

…and as long as I had those colors of fabric ready to go, I also cut out lots of leaves using Sizzix Die#656667:

(I don’t need any leaves for any current projects, but I’ve learned that it’s handy to have many leaf sizes available to throw into projects spontaneously, so I want to have more on hand.) My goal was to get all my materials prepared so I’d have “handwork” ready to work on after dinner when I was sitting with my husband. I always like to get a jump on the next day’s sewing adventure by fusing up small components or cutting out fabric pieces while we watch tv. Anyway, I traced all the large size petals onto Wonder Under:

…and then once I fused those to the wrong side of my purple and blue fabrics…

…I was ready to go upstairs to make dinner. Once we’d finished eating, I began my night of fusing. I began by adding many small purple and blue petals to the center of my flower-to-be:

I didn’t take any pictures, but I cut all those small petals (and probably a couple hundred more!) just by cutting up old scraps on my Sizzix machine. It is very easy for me to get all this fusing done while watching tv with Ernie because I just place an Applique Pressing Sheet on top of my Omnigrid Cutting/Ironing Pad and I’ve got a nice little compact work area that fits in front of the couch. I then added my next layer of yellow/green petals:

and then I added the final layer of dark petals. Here are my 2 newest bad boys. each one is about 14 inches in diameter:

They are cousins to their yellow counterparts…

…and they’ll all be part of the same quilt someday soon! I sure hope your new year is filled with all kinds of colorful and fun sewing projects!

9 Comments

  1. Alice Says:

    Patsy!

    WOW, and WOW ,and WOW! I really like the colours you chose, they really pop. I’m inclined to like the darker version better, I think it may be due to the receeding darker colours and the advancing warmer colours. The lighter version is nice, but doesn’t have quite the same WOW factor for me.

    I have a question about your fusing technique. Do you cut out each individual wonder under? or do you fuse the entire thing to the fabric, then put it through the Sizzix? I did re-read what you posted, but I’m not quite sure how or what you did. It looks to me that you traced the image onto the Wonder Under. Then had scraps that you fused the Wonder Under to, and then cut out the petal shapes?

    I wonder… instead of tracing, could you run the Wonder Under through the Sizzix too? And then you have the Wonder Under and fabric ready to go?

    -Alice

  2. Michele Says:

    I have the same question as Alice, can/do you fuse the fabrics before using the Sizzix? If so, do you take the paper off before or after the shapes are cut?

  3. Kelly Jackson Says:

    Love the cousins….and I know the quilt will be beautiful once you finish ading all your magic threadwork 🙂

    BTW….I take my paper off after and just before I’m ready to use them….that way they never bond to any other pieces.

    Your Sizzix Loving Friend,
    Kelly

  4. SewCalGal Says:

    Beautiful. Inspirational. Going to be spectacular with your amazing FMQ work.

    SewCalGal
    http://www.sewcalgal.blogspot.com

  5. Leslie Says:

    Nice play Patsy… beautiful! Just what we need to start out this wintery January. I too was wondering – it looks like you cut the tinier blue petals in by hand, as I see they were traced onto the fusible… then the larger cuts were from your sizzix dies?

    Those kissin’ cousins are first rate! Thanks for the inspiration, and love the tip about the little fusing station on pressing sheet/omnigrid mat. I’m gonna try that.

  6. Teresa Harich Says:

    OOOOHHH!! Gotta get those dies! Your fantasy flowers are amazing! I, too, am waiting for the answer about fusing. I’ve always applied the fusible to the fabric, then cut with my die cutter. Are the traced lines just to let you know how big your scrap needs to be before running it through?

    Enjoy your time in Asheville! It’s beautiful there! I live about 100 miles southeast and thankfully, don’t get that much snow. We did get a couple of inches Christmas night.

  7. Claire Pereira Says:

    Beautiful flowers. Love those fabrics you use.
    Can’t wait to get my dies so I can make some beautiful flowers too!
    Watching your work closely cause I love it! 🙂

  8. Dianne Giles Says:

    Awesome!! Have thought about acquiring a cutting machine, but, think I may overdo the cutting and neglect the sewing part (LOL)!!

  9. Jean-sophie Says:

    I am almost off the fence and ready to buy one of the fabric cutting machines. I have a project that needs lots and lots of leaves, so that Sizzix die looks VERY interesting to me. I’m curious just how big (or small) those leaves are? (I found the die on the Sizzix site, but it didn’t say …)