mini quilt love

I have been participating on and off in the mini quilt swap on flickr. Each month has a new theme or technique, and the theme for September was owl and/or mushrooms. I'm not a huge owl or mushroom fan. I can appreciate the cuteness, but I don't go crazy for them. Houses? Now we're talking! But you knew that, right?

Look at this wonderful owl that Lucette sent to me! Look at all those stitches!




When I saw what the theme was, I knew that I wanted to try sonjaartisania's gnome and mushroom tutorial. Isn't her gnome cute?! Here is my free pieced version for Lucette.




I've made a free piecing discovery recently. Maybe this tip is already out there, but I'll say it again if it is. You can take any simple paper pieced pattern and free piece it. Instead of sewing it to paper, use the pattern as a map to sew the pieces in order. This way you can liberate almost any pattern. A little "duh", but this was a real eye opener for me. Plus, who wants to pick off all the paper when you are done sewing? Not me!

If I wanted to make more gnomes this way, I could have a whole village of them. Short, tall, fat, skinny, longer legs, facing different ways. Free piecing gives a lot of variations to one pattern. I don't know about you, but I get tired of making the same block over and over again. I think that is why I love free piecing so much. It gives quilting a little spice.




***Now for the giveaway***

The give away I mentioned yesterday is for this pumpkin panel that I bought recently. What was I thinking? I don't think I will ever use it. It is super cute, but truly I'm not into a lot of seasonal decorations nor do I have much wall space for it.


The giveaway is for the panel, not the fabric destroying dog in the picture. You don't want him anyway, right?


The Rules
1. This is only open to commenters in the US. Sorry to all of you who live outside of the US.
2. Second, leave a comment on this post letting me know you would like to win this panel.

The winner will be selected on Monday.