lake erie | Night Quilter

One of my favorite parts about traveling is the variety of new sights that you get to see. I like to look at things from an up-close-and-personal perspective, especially when it comes to nature. With my background in environmental science and ecology, I like to think that I see differences and similarities in landscape and vegetation that a normal passerby may not notice. Nature is endlessly beautiful, and when seen from an intimate distance, that beauty is intensified greatly. Here are some bits of beauty as seen in my travels over the past week.

These color palettes are created using Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 and my photographs.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Charcoal, Coal, Pewter, Black, Stone, Taupe

The beach on Lake Erie is a nice balance of fine sand and smooth rocks of varying sizes. I’ve become accustomed to the rocky Maine coast, and the beaches here in Ohio are a gentle respite from those footwear-requiring, albeit beautiful, beaches. Varied rock types, including many conglomerates and fossils can be found along the beaches, which add to the aesthetic.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Palm, Laurel, Black, Chocolate, Shale, Coal

These green buds were too awesome to pass by. It’s another earthy, dark palette, but the balance of green and shady grey-blues with the dark black/brown are a beautiful embodiment of green goodness.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Evergreen, Fog, Shale, Palm, Ivy, Parsley

Buttonbush is a wetland shrub typically found in standing water. When I was a wetland scientist doing delineations, we LOVED finding buttonbush since it is an obligatory wetland plant and therefore a clear indicator of the wetland area, not to mention its gorgeous and whimsical flower. This palette is included more for the novelty of the plant than the colors, but it’s another lighter variation on the green and blue nature palette.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Spice, Gold, Amber, Garnet, Rich Red, Peridot

I wouldn’t leave you without at least one big burst of color! This tiger lily from my mom’s garden just burns with vibrancy! While tiger lilies bloom in the height of summer, I can’t help but feel a bit of autumn in this palette. I’m a summer lover, though, so I am NOT hurrying autumn along by any stretch. I just need to make that clear. I’ll take summer for as long as I can have it!

Enjoy! I’d love to see what you create with these palettes.

It feels like I’ve been on vacation for most of July, which is not a bad thing! While traveling and away from my sewing machine, I have taken the opportunity to try my hand at English Paper Piecing (EPP) for the first time, delving into stitching my first and second Lucy Boston Patchwork of the Crosses blocks. I was inspired by Jan at Sew and Sow Farm blog to try the Patchwork of the Crosses as my first EPP.I completed my first block (left) during the car ride from Maine to Ohio, and have almost completed my second block (right) since I’ve been here at our rental house on Lake Erie. I have had a lot of fun finding the perfect little peeks of fabric for each of the pieces, called “fussy cutting” by the quilting community, and decidedly meticulous but perhaps not so fussy, per a discussion I recently had with my artist brother (more on that in a later post).

The coast of Lake Erie is gorgeous and very different than the coast of Maine. I had a good shot of my EPP wips on the rocks earlier today, and here are the results:

Playing with depth of field in photographs is so much fun. I love the difference a little camera setting adjustment can make with the photo outcome. — Playing with depth of field in photographs is so much fun. I love the difference a little change of focus can make with the photo outcome.

Beautiful rocks with a gorgeous backdrop.

Lark by Amy Butler lends itself well to "fussy cutting". — Lark by Amy Butler lends itself well to “fussy cutting”.

I have not yet removed the papers from either of the blocks, except the four center bee pieces more as a test to make sure I could get the paper out than anything else, and I love the way the backs look. Every little basting stitch, the crisp folds, the tiny hand stitches holding them all together: beauty.

I think I have decided that these blocks will be turned into a table runner or centerpiece. My plan is to make another block the same as my first with the four bees in the center, and use the new Lark-heavy block as the center with the two bee blocks on either end, joined and bordered by some other background fabric. I still have to decide what color to use in the outermost border for the center block, but I’m leaning toward yellow.

I then might add one more outer edge of some other color, to make the center block larger than the outer ones. I am really enjoying the process of English Paper Piecing, specifically how portable it is and how it is so easy to pick up and put down for even just a five minute sewing stint. I’m looking forward to exploring other EPP template shapes. So far I’ve found hexagon, diamond, and triangle templates, but it looks like there are no rules; any shape or combination of shapes can be made into templates. Let the pattern creation begin! Well, after I finish these blocks of course.

What is your favorite EPP template or pattern?