Heidi Finds

Summer is the time to travel, right? Here is a fun project using the United States of America as inspiration. You can download the project here. (Alaska and Hawaii are also included.) But, to make it more personal, you could print photos on EQ Printable Fabric and integrate them into the quilt. It’s easy with EQ7. Of course, you can make the quilt any size you’d like, but mine is set to (without borders) 20 x 12.5. I started with Texas. I used the Tape Measurer  to measure Texas. It’s about 5.3 inches wide. So, I re-sized my photo to be 5.3 inches wide as well. Then, I clicked  Libraries > Fabric Library > Import > from image file >  locate your Texas photo > Open > Add to Sketchbook. Your Texas photo can now be used like any other fabric. Since some of the states are oddly shaped it

SewCalGal has written a great tutorial on how to make a wine bottle vest. Check it out here! It’s a very cute idea and would make a great gift. It would also be fun to make it more personal with photos (or anything you like) printed on EQ Printable Fabric. Thanks for posting, SewCalGal!

An EQ7 feature you may not know about is Photo Patchwork Quilts. The style of quilts made with this feature are often called pixel quilts. They are super easy to do in EQ7. Click Quilt > New Quilt > Photo Patchwork > Import Image > Preview That’s it! So, here is my original photo. The more blocks you put in your quilt, the more detail from the photo will be visible, as you can see with the three different versions shown here. But, don’t forget, though, these blocks can add up fast. The third quilt has over 2550. Quite the sewing project! I think there are lots of possibilities for fun projects using this feature! If this inspires you to make something, let us know! Email photos to Heidi@electricquilt.com.

Happy Father’s Day!                 This quilt uses EQ Printables to print off the photos (of course). I also added a border to allow a place for the kids (or dogs) to write messages to dad or grampa, or whoever. You can use a fabric marker or fabric paint to make the messages. I hope everyone has a nice Father’s Day!

This quilt, by Tula Pink, was spotted at Spring Market.                       I love the idea, a sampler put into a larger design. I made a few in EQ7.             One of the things in EQ that make it really easy, in the Line Brush tool. If you click and hold on the Paintbrush tool, other paintbrush options will pop up. One is the Line Brush Tool.                     I used the Line Brush to draw out a rough shape.             Then I just filled the shape in with the blocks I wanted to use. EQ7 makes it pretty easy!     If this inspires you to make something, let us know! Email photos to Heidi@electricquilt.com.

Have you noticed these black and white crossword looking things showing up lately? They are called QR (Quick Response) Codes. If you take a picture of the QR Code with your smartphone it will usually take you to a website, but it can also encode other stuff, like your contact information, or any text you’d like. The above QR code links to electricquilt.com. You can make them for free at sites like qrcode.kaywa.com. Again, you can set it up to link to anything you want. So, link it directly to the sign-up for your newsletter, to friend your shop on Facebook, go directly to your Etsy shop, follow you on Pinterest or Twitter…it’s easier than handing out web addresses and hoping people type it in and find what they are looking for.  I was thinking that they would be a fun addition to quilt labels. So, if someone sees your

Valerie at re-engineered.blogspot.com made a beautiful quilt with split hexagons. What a great idea! I made one in EQ7. You can download the file here. Here is how I did it…. After playing around for a bit I decided just to make a long skinny block. Mine is 2 x 30. I then started a Vertical Strip Quilt. I popped the blocks in and flipped every other one. Then I started playing around. For this quilt I right clicked on a color then clicked Add Shades & Tints. It will add darker and lighter variations of the color you picked to the sketchbook. Then, I clicked the Random Recolor tool. Here is that same quilt after I clicked  Random Recolor > Map to fabrics. The first quilt after  Random Recolor Tool > Shift Hue. The first quilt and  Random Recolor Tool > Randomize. And of course you could make a