This week’s two tips comes to you a day late. With a guild lecture yesterday, THANK YOU Village Squares in New York!! and a hubby with a replaced hip, it got away from me. I love sharing my Egyptian Tentmakers’ Applique pieces with quilters. Yesterday I was “at” Village Squares Quilt Guild in Westchester, New York and tomorrow I will be “at” Oregon Coastal Quilters guild in South Beach, Oregon. I love how Zoom has allowed me to continue lecturing for guilds when I couldn’t be there in person. Are you in a quilt guild? I find it is a great way to meet and hang out with like minded people, quilters! With Zoom coming into play last year when travel was discouraged, it opened up a platform to continue meeting and sharing.

#1 – Join a quilt guild! They share the love of quilting, have speakers with trunk shows sharing the many aspects of quilting. Plus every one I have been a part of or visited is doing wonderful comfort/charity work for their community.

To continue the idea of sharing… Over on Instagram the group of designers who had the Snowball Fight Challenge is moving to a new block this month. Innovation Renovation is looking at a simple blocks and coming up with some new ideas using said blocks. The block for March is RAIL FENCE! A favorite when learning to quilt. I think almost every beginner sampler uses this block. A Rail Fence is defined as a block with three or more rails. Monday was our Fabric Pull. I’ll show you mine below. I’m excited about working with some Kaffe Fassett Fat quarter fabrics I had in my stash and a gray background!

Hmmmmmm, wonder what I’m making??? I already have a plan and will be sharing the process each Monday remaining in March. Check out my Instagram page for my process photos. My post on Monday shared the other designers’ pages so you can follow along. Please take a minute to follow me on Instagram. As I believe I’ve said, Instagram is a new place I am sharing my quilting journey and I’d love to have you along for the shares. (@debbiewendtquilting) Oh, Instagram isn’t new, but new for me. <grin>

To change the subject a bit, have you tried a pressing clapper? One of the girls in my guild, (Hi Diane S.), shared hers at a Getaway a couple years ago. Wonderful to get those seams to lay flat without standing and pressing forever. So, I called my dad and BAM! He made me not one, but two!! I think I’m in love! I have always been a steam presser as I like nice flat seams. I think will take some time to remember to use it on each seam. (It does slow down my process time, but results is great flat seams.) Here are the gorgeous ones my Dad made for me!!

The dark wood is from Belize and the other is oak. Heavy and great! The oak for shorter seams and the longer one for block seams. As I mentioned, they are new to me and I’ve only used them a few times. I’ll have to report back, but I love the results so far. These wooden clappers along with the wool pad I have on my ironing board are super!

#2 – A wool ironing pad helps to pull the heat through your fabric (seams). The wooden clapper holds the heat/steam!

The Great Board behind my ironing board is from TNT Quilt Boards by Tracy and Tim Kennedy, no affiliate, a happy customer. They are here in Massachusetts.

in quilting,

Debbie