Paper Tape and Pressing Tools

I said I would check:  Surgical paper tape is available at my Safeway pharmacy so I would guess it can be purchased elsewhere if needed.  If your paper piecing is too big to print on one piece of paper in your printer the paper tape is the way to tape pieces together.  It is not gooey on the needle and it folds like ordinary paper.

I mentioned in response to a comment last week that I love Sulky Paper Solvy for paper piecing.  I feel I should mention its only downside.  It scorches easily and gets brittle if you iron down each seam.  My solution is to press with this clever little tool.  I actually find it does a better job and the paper remains stable until I am done.

Bought this at Joann's.

I've heard that a 1" wallpaper roller works well too.  I know we used to have one, but have no clue where it might be so I haven't tried it yet.

I have been scurrying around getting the house spiffy for houseguests, one of whom is the granddaughter who drew the design for my Phoenix quilt.  I used my recent sewing time to finish setting fused fabric in place for my little dog.  I have not ironed it down yet, and I am glad for that because I noticed one piece that is the wrong color.  It makes a lineal black blob where there shouldn't be a straight line of dark fur.  Funny how you can work away and not notice something like that until a day later.  No photo yet as I don't want to show it until I am happy with it.  After the family leaves I will spend time creating a background behind the dog.  Still puzzling on that one.

I will have a forced break from sewing this week as Sweet Granddaughter will be using the sewing room as her bedroom.  Perfect time to catch up on some other things that need doing...such as hiking!

Sew a Happy Seam this week.

Paper Piecing Large

I'm Home!  I have been to Annapolis (MD), Palm Beach (FL), Austin (TX), home for 4 days, Seattle (WA), through Grand Teton NP (in low clouds and rain!), and finally home for the summer.  One funeral, three graduations and great fun with family and friends.  Coast to coast in a car.

I took my sewing machine in for its annual check-up.  All is well.  It has accomplished 1,158,894 stitches in 13 months.  You needed to know that, right?  It has now been relegated to a storage shed so my sewing room can be repurposed as a bedroom for a week for a visting granddaughter.  My sewing room is so squeaky clean and uncluttered that I don't recognize it.  I still have a fusible project of my little dog to work on until company arrives, but won't need the machine for awhile.

Reporting in.  A few weeks ago I showed you a computer-generated spiral for my next quilt, and was concerned about getting the paper piecing accomplished.  The problem is that the spiral is 18 inches long and my Sulky Paper Solvy is only 11 inches long.  I ended up digitally "cutting" the pattern and printing it in three pieces.  I cut those pieces roughly and aligned all the lines using the dotted lines as guides.  Then I fastened them together with surgical paper tape, turned it over and cut off the overlapping edges.

Pattern printed, cut apart and and ready to tape together

TIP:  You could butt the edges together if you want, but I find that it is easy to miss perfection when taping with this method.  Even a slight misalignment could skew the whole spiral.

Wearing my Senior Tester hat I grabbed some stash fabric and paper pieced the reconstructed spiral.  It worked beautifully so I can enthusiastically recommend this method.  I confess that I had some of the tape on hand, but haven't looked in the pharmacy to see if they still sell it.  Note to self:  check it out.

Tester stitched.

Sew a happy seam this week.