I forgot to mention last week that the paper pieced blocks that you are seeing here are part of the Chrismas Pickle pattern. It's a beautiful quilt and I am enjoying working on it so far but It comes with nearly no guidance or instructions. I must have made ten different types of mistakes so far, and have made adjustments along the way. I am really enjoying the automatic cutter in the B580 at the end of all those short seams. It saves me so much clipping and bobbin thread. I do not have the proper 1/4" foot for the wider stitch plate of the 580 (I went from a 5mm machine to a 9mm) but I have been making it work by holding the thread ends when I get started. At first I was using two sewing machines, the 580 to paper piece and the Aurora to sew the 1/4" seams, but I got tired of sewing in two different rooms and ironing the seams in yet another! I now have a great little set up using a 12" ironing board (thrifted new) and a tiny Clover iron (bought eons ago for a class on machine applique) to the left of the B580.
I found that my friend's advice to reduce the stitch length to 1.5mm while paper piecing works equally well when sewing the curves. It's logical that you should get smoother curves if you take tinier steps... It makes them terribly difficult to unpick though, so think twice about which side of the curve goes with what and sew once. Lessons learned!
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It is looking great!!! I look forward to seeing it all together! You will need to put in a design wall in the new studio.
Posted by: Lisa | January 19, 2014 at 06:23 PM
Juliette, these are simply stunning blocks! Love!
Posted by: Erika Mulvenna | January 21, 2014 at 12:43 PM