While working on my daffodil wall hanging I realized I enjoy having hand work that can travel with me. You'd think that with all the knitting I do travelling hand work should be pretty easy, but I don't tend to choose projects that are small and are easy to do a few stitches on when waiting places. I liked the applique, but even the small project was a bit big for my purse, and I haven't found very many applique patterns that inspire me to make them. Enter English Paper Piecing. I know this has been around for ages, but I've never felt drawn to it. I love that it's fairly small, I can just take a few pieces with me at a time, and the seams are short enough that it's easy to pack everything up when my turn is called or my break is over.
Since I want to travel with my EPP I decided my first project should be a case. I love this pattern from The Zen of Making. It has a front pocket for my thread, scissors, papers, and seam ripper. Inside is a divided pocket for my fabric and my completed flowers. When I was really young I found a quilting book at my grandmas and decided I wanted to give it a try. Knowing nothing about quilting and having the advise of two very skilled seamstresses who also knew next to nothing about quilting I decided my first quilt would be a Grandmother's Flower Garden. The quilt never made it past the planning stage, but the pattern has always had a special place in my heart. Since Grandmother's Flower Garden is a common EPP pattern I've decided to make flowers for that quilt. I sense this is going to be a project many years in the making, but that's okay. Sometimes slow stitching is exactly what the mind and heart need.
