Celebrating 51 Years of Star Trek

Today is the 51st Anniversary
of the Very First Episode of Star Trek!
Congratulations to the host of artists
who have contributed to this adventure
for the last half-century. 

Last year, to celebrate the 50th anniversary, I got a tattoo on my wrist of good ol' NCC-1701,

but it's so teeny it's hard to photograph.

This year, I made these blocks!!!

Anyone who's known me for more than a half an hour knows that I'm a pretty serious Trekkie. (I have double majors in TNG and TOS, with a minor in VOY. I am proficient with DS9, but it's an area I'm working on. Sooner or later I will get to ENT, and I'M ENTIRELY BESIDE MYSELF WITH EXCITEMENT ABOUT DISCOVERY!)

Star Trek has been a source of inspiration, and comfort, and fun for me since before I can remember, and making these blocks was a total delight.

When I finished piecing the block in the original classic-looking colorway (above with the whites and blues), I decided that I had gone invested too much time and energy to stop there, and a 2nd colorway just had to happen. This one should actually fit into the "2 Palette" quilt I started in 2014.

Rainbow colorway!

These tiny pieces are crazy even for me.

(the one to the left of the dime - it's so teeny you might miss it)

I love this total mess on the back! 

Weirdly, my Star Trek fabric stash is not as impressive as you might think - I'm actually really selective in this department.

As always, thanks for reading!

Happy Star Trek Anniversary, and Live Long and Prosper!

-Reyna de Courcy

6 Completed Blocks: Eggs, Moths, Owls etc

Well, the last 2 months have been so busy, I have several post that I've been meaning to make, but just haven't had any spare time. Now that I've got a minute, I can't decide where to start, so I'm going to keep it simple for now and share the 6 blocks that I've completed since my last post - all in the new palette I talked about last time.

I'm especially proud of this first block.

'String of Pearls' - 61 pieces, edges finishing at 3.75",
designed specifically for this egg print with the Reverse Window Shopping technique 

I've been calling it 'String of Pearls' and I think of Marge Simpson every time.

The block design was inspired by this egg print - I used the Reverse Window Shopping technique to single out individual eggs.

Martha Negley Westwood Egg Linen

Ended up being 61 pieces. Yikes! It took forever, but I enjoyed the process!

'String of Pearls' with Eggs, detail

And then after that I needed a break so I went with something nice and simple.

This next one makes me think of the windows at my friend Jim's historic farm house in New Hampshire.

Jim's Windows - setting the table

So I'm nicknaming it 'Jim's Windows'.

'Jim's Windows' in lavender and grey

(I'm currently working on designing a block in honour of his diningroom table - more on that soon.)

This next one I made as part of my 2nd round of the Hexatopia class at the City Quilter (more on THAT soon! so behind on my posts!)

And then this one I made with the Reverse Window Shopping Technique, isolating these Tim Holtz moths.

Moths - designed with the Reverse Window Shopping technique

Last, but not least is one that my sister Tahli nicknamed for me,
it's called 'Ancient Alien Technology'

'Ancient Alien Technology'

It's one that I'm really looking forward to trying with different prints.

That's all for now, but hopefully in the near future I'll be posting with follow-up about Karen Nyberg's Astronomical Quilt, as well as news of my current out-of-town adventures in Chicago and Los Angeles, and a loonnnng overdue post about my 2nd round teaching Hexatopia at the CQ.

Thanks for reading!
All the best,
Reyna

New Project, New Palette, New Scale, New Blocks

Like so many of us, I suffer from a bit of project ADD.

The blocks I've been posting so far are all for a quilt I'm calling "Experiment Year 2014" (more on that quilt later), but I've pretty much completed all the fun parts (designing and piecing the blocks), and now it's a matter of putting it all together so...
naturally I just had to go ahead and start a whole new quilt. :)

Picking out the palette is definitely one of my favorite parts.
I'd been mulling over this idea for some time, so it was really great to finally pull out my stash and put it together.

Basically, the idea I wanted to play with is to take two distinctly different palettes and jam them together into one quilt.

So for the first palette, I wanted to go with something soft, and reserved...

1st Palette: Emphasis Lavender

I dug out all my lavenders, greys and a handful of select creams.
I'm really hoping to emphasize the lavender, but I don't have too many in my stash, and I'm feeling very picky on the hue: on the grey/blue side rather than the pink/plum side.

For my second palette, what I wanted to do was something inspired by the some of the brighter fabrics from Ghana, but then I was also spending a lot of time looking at Guatemalan fabrics...
I'm slightly disappointed that what I came up with looks more like the Skittles palette ... but that's a bit harsh, and actually I really like it.

2nd Palette: Brights

There's bright reds, burgundies, tangerines, pumpkins, marigolds, limes, kelly greens, dark royal blues, and then I couldn't help but throw in some chartreuse to muck it up a little.

And then I JAMMED them together!

Palette for my new project: jamming together disparate palettes

Another new development: up until now I've been making blocks with sides finishing at 3", but I've decided that one third of the blocks in this quilt will be larger, with sides finishing at 3.75"

So far I've made 4 blocks in this new palette, 3 are in the new size. Bigger = more room for more detail.

Four new blocks!

All sliced up! I kept this design simple, because I want to frame this angel

She's reading '100 Years of Solitude' out loud to a murmuration of starlings as they rest on a telephone wire

I've been calling this block Spinning Bricks

Spinning Bricks with ravens

All sliced up! I've been calling this one Birds Nest

Birds Nest

Swamp Angel, Hexagon Variation (Yep, that's you Melody Miller! Love these Mustangs!)

That's all for now!

Thanks for reading!

All the best,

Reyna

Class Announcement: 'Hexatopia' returning to the CQ in September

I'm happy to announce that I will once again be teaching

the 'Hexatopia' class at The City Quilter in NYC!
We'll be English Paper Piecing Unusual Hexagonal Blocks

The class will be 3 sessions this time: 

Thursday nights, 5pm - 8pm, 

September 4th, 11th, and 25th.

As I say in my official blurb, the class is designed to liberate and empower your English Paper Piecing adventures! We will be leaving basic store-bought shapes in the dust, and instead draw from an infinite vocabulary of polygons to create intricate hexagonal blocks!

Although we will spend time exploring traditional-style hexagonal blocks, the emphasis of the class will be on tweaking those traditional blocks to make them unique to the individual quilter, and most of all, improvising entirely new ones unlike the quiltiverse has ever seen!


Notes on experience level:

Interested students should be already confident with basic English Paper Piecing. 

Luckily, it's a super-simple technique that anyone can pick up quickly. 

Check out this video, and you'll see what I mean. 

Students should also be comfortable working with small pieces, small stitches, and understand that (as with all hand-sewing), best results come with plenty of time and care. 

The good news is that

THERE WILL BE NO MATH INVOLVED. 

You won't even need to use the numbers on your ruler unless you really want to. (I don't.)

Some more specifics about what we will be doing:

On the 1st day we will warm up by drafting simple, traditional-style blocks, get comfortable with this system of working (all the things I learned the hard way), and play with fabric selection and fussycutting.

The 2nd day will be tweaking the shapes and lines of those traditional blocks to make them more unique, and most importantly, improvising entirely new ones!

We will spend most of the 3rd day exploring the Reverse Window Shopping technique that I used to design the Strawberry block from my first post, and the Montpelier Ducks block. We'll also take some time to talk about ideas for projects one might make from the finished blocks.

Deets:

Again, the class will be 3 sessions:

Thursday nights, 5pm - 8pm, 

September 4th, 11th, and 25th.

All sessions will be held at
The City Quilter
133 W 25th Street NYC
(btn 6th and 7th avenues)

To sign up, you can call the CQ at 212-807-0390
Or just stop by. (Hours and directions here.)

Supplies:

In the interest of including absolutely everything there is to know about the class, I thought I'd go ahead and publish the supply list here.

Most items are available at the store and can be picked up before class.
Items that the CQ does NOT carry are marked with an asterisk*

- Precut paper pieces: 3.75" Hexagons, Small Pack of 12 pieces
    (If you already have hexagons in your stash, any hexagons with sides between 3" and 4.5" are great.
- Colored pencils*
- Something to use as a straight-edge - at least 7" long, but try to avoid anything longer than 15"
    (The Creative Grid non-slip acrylic rulers are ideal)
- Regular ol' pencil with a good eraser*
- X-Acto knife*
- Pins
- Needles: applique sharps
- Fabric scissors (small ones are nice for this)
- Paper scissors*
- Non-fancy thread for basting (whatever you've got laying around)
- Cotton thread for piecing (we will discus thread color selection in class, but bring a selection from your stash if you've got 'em)

Fabric:
Quilting weight cotton (avoid batiks to start)

We will be using small pieces in this class, so if you've got a stash of fat quarters and scraps, go ahead and bring a whole bunch! (Look especially for blenders, tone-on-tones, solids, and small-scale prints that you'd be excited to fussy-cut.)

If you are shopping for the class, go ahead and get:
- 1/4 yrd or more of 1 or more interesting small-scale prints (for fussycutting!)
- 1/16 or more of 3 or more blenders or solids that look nice with the prints


And that's everything I can think of to tell you about the class!
Let me know if you have any questions!

As always, thanks for reading!!!
All the best,
Reyna