Jennie's Threads

I know that I haven't finished my Ice Cream Soda quilt yet. And I know that I haven't finished my Mandolin Quilt yet. But I'm making good progress on both. So when Jodie @ Tales of Cloth announced her latest block of the month, I didn't feel too guilty about ordering the free taster pack. This year's quilt is a medallion quilt, so the taster pack is the very centre section. I'm always really impressed with how quickly these packages arrive from Australia. I had already decided to use my Zuma fabric for this tester piece at least.... but when I opened the packet I was quite surprised at how small the pieces were. Luckily Zuma has quite small scale prints! I spent a while deciding on prints and placement. At the same time, Jodie shared an updated picture of where the quilt was heading.... not a finished version but enough to make me think. And I have to confess that I'm not sure. Looking at it, I don't think Zuma will work well for the whole quilt. ...

It's been 4 months since I last shared an update on my Mandolin Quilt. But I have been working on it behind the scenes. I now have 16 finished blocks, just four off the finish line. This shot is at 14 blocks when I was prepping the next ones shortly before Joshua was born. And here are the two blocks I pieced while being induced.... 30 hours! I'm not quite as up to date on my joining blocks, but those are pretty quick to piece once I've cut the fabric. But I've decided to move the goalposts... I have plenty of the fabric left (and I might have picked up a bit more in recent destashes), and I'm really enjoying sewing these blocks, so I'm going to go up to 25 blocks and make a quilt for our bed. So watch out for more updates rather than a finished top!

This might be my current favourite project! the Mandolin blocks designed by Tales of Cloth are an absolute delight to put together - the paper pieces are easy on the hands, and the method of construction is nice long seams. I never considered how the weight of paper affects English Paper Piecing until recently when I started using pieces from a few different sources. I've always used papers from Paper Pieces in the US before, or from Sew and Quilt in the UK, both of whom use a similar weight card for their pieces. Last summer I started the Round We go sew along using paper pieces from Sue Daley in Australia. These are slightly heavier weight and glossy. I slowly realised that these feel like harder work, even though I never sew through the papers. And then there are the pieces from Tales of Cloth, which are lighter weight than I was use to. When I first recieved them for my Ice Cream Soda quilt last year, I was worried they were too light, but they are perfect - gentle on the hand...