Written by Laura Chaney, daughter
Hopefully you read out blog regularly, and so you saw that our poll question this week is asking “Have you ever tried English paper piecing?”
Today, it’s obvious that both mom and I love English paper piecing and all the fun things we’ve gone onto do with this technique, but it wasn’t always this way. We first learned English paper piecing at the AQS Pacudah Show in 2011,which was the year the city was deluged with horrible floods right before the quilt show, causing all of the quilts, classes and vendors to be relocated to various empty buildings around the city.
The classes and lectures had all been moved to a local church that had lots of classroom and chapel spaces available. Our English paper-piecing lecture was in the chapel, so we arrived at the church and took our seats in the pews. Lectures at the AQS shows are usually about 45 minutes long and most tend to be presented in the traditional “lecture” format, but the English paper piecing one included a little history and antique English paper-pieced quilts, a demo of the techniques, and our own little sample pack to make a single Grandmother’s Flower Garden flower.
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| A more recent flower. |
It’s fun to go to these shows as a mother-daughter team, but our that also means we end up doing a bit of negotiating about the classes and events we’ll attend. Let’s just say this wasn’t Mom’s first choice for a lecture. We both made our sample flowers that same night back in the hotel room, and ended up purchasing some paper templates the next day from Paper Pieces (now the only place I get my paper templates)! We both were hooked.
One thing led to another, and eventually we used what we learned lecture and the many hours of basting hexagons after that to develop the technique used in Contain It! English Paper-Pieced Style Accessories.
So first, please vote in the poll!
But we also would love to know if you have any good stories about a time you were reluctant to try a new technique that you ended up loving! We’d love it if you share your story in the comments below!
It's so wonderful how something like that class developed into your book! I must say that I envy you two being able to do all these things together! I went to a few community center classes with my Mom and I know she would have LOVE to go to Paducah for one of the shows! Laura, I couldn't really vote in your poll. I have tried EPP and am undecided, more because of lack of skill so far. But i will be working on it again, and making some fun projects, including a container from your book!