Behind the Mouse: The Electric Quilt Blog

What a fun weekend! A huge thank you to all the students who joined us at EQ Academy last weekend—what a great time we had! A special thanks to our awesome teachers: Lori Miller, Nancy Roelfsema, Jenny Novinsky, Sara Seuberling, and Janice E. Frisch! Classes were wonderful as always and students learned so much. Scroll down for photos and info about our next EQ Academy. Here are some of the quilts the beginners learned to design! How cool are these?! STUDENT REVIEWS: “For a year, I played with EQ8 with minimal instruction/education. I had some success but more frustration than anything. All that changed this week at EQ Academy. I’m thrilled with how much I’ve learned and will definitely tell my friends about it!” “EQ is a fantastic software program for ANY quilter! But, it’s more than that—it is the PEOPLE behind it—helpful, friendly, just a great group. Thank you

Thank you to everyone who participated in last month’s design challenge! Your quilts are so beautiful, be sure to view them all here. Winners Two winners were randomly selected. Congratulations to…. Winner 1: Cynthia Concha Winner 2: Christy J Honorable Mentions Don’t forget to look at all the amazing submissions to this challenge. Here are a few honorable mentions! We also wanted to share that Leigh Headington of Sweet Tea Girls Patterns used EQ8 to design two of the quilt designs shared on Northcott’s website for the collection! How cool! More Chances to Win Live Boldly by Charisma Horton for Timeless Treasures is May’s Fabric of the Month! Download the collection and enter our design challenge for another chance to win some fabric!

It’s time for another EQ Design Challenge! May’s Fabric of the Month is Live Boldly by Charisma Horton for Timeless Treasures. Live Boldly is Charisma’s vibrant and versatile debut collection! With 30 beautiful colors to choose from, these fabrics are sure to make your next sewing project shine! A bundle of these fabrics will be given away to two lucky winners! Submit your EQ design featuring Live Boldly below…all instructions and contest details are in this post. Good luck! To enter In order to enter for the giveaway you must submit a quilt using the current Fabric of the Month AND comment on at least one other person’s quilt you like by the end of the month. If you’re the first person to submit a quilt, make sure to come back and comment on someone else’s quilt before the contest ends. Instructions for how to submit an image are at the bottom of this post. Download this month’s

This year we’re doing a Sew-Along!  If you’d like to sew along with us and get more details about the project, check them out here. One reason we decided to do the sew-along was to make sure everyone on staff knows how to quilt (since we’ve hired some new people recently). But, we also thought it’d be fun to post about so you can get to know us a little better! Each month, we’ll feature one staff member and their block in the quilt. This month we’re featuring Sara! Sara started working for EQ as a graphic design intern in 2003, then moved to full-time in May of 2004. So, quick (and easy) math puts her at 20 years! In those 20 years she’s gone from intern to Director of Business Operations which means she handles a lot of the “business” duties of the company, including HR-type responsibilities. Additionally, Sara

Don’t you love passing by a farm and spotting a barn quilt? Have you ever thought of using your EQ8 to design one? We all know we can design an actual quilt in EQ8, but did you know you can design your very own barn quilt in EQ8 too? It’s easy! Our friends at Quiltfolk have just announced their Barn Quilt Breakthrough that makes owning a beautiful barn quilt less time-consuming and more accessible: For the first time, Quiltfolk is offering custom Barn Quilts in a proprietary way—no painting required, with infinite colors and designs available! Two ways to order! Choose from pre-designed options or upload your own from EQ8! 1.) Pre-designed barn quilt: Choose from a selection of 30 pre-made options plucked straight from the EQ8 Block Library. You’ll recognize popular blocks like Mariner’s Star, Bear’s Paw, Monkey Wrench, Log Cabin, and lots more that are perfect for your home! 2.) Custom

Welcome to the EQ8 Block Spotlight! Each month we highlight a block from the EQ8 Block Library with a few design ideas. Then we want you to show us what you can do with the block. We hope these posts will inspire you to try something new and expand your EQ skills! This month’s block: Tangled Stars Where to find it: 01 Classic Pieced > Eccentrics Design ideas to spark your creativity My first quilt is a 3 x 3 horizontal layout. I alternated the Tangled Stars block with a pinwheel block I drew on the Block Worktable. I colored the pinwheel block to highlight the large star in the layout. For my second quilt, I edited the featured block to add more piecing in the diagonal points of the design. This gave me more patches in the block so I could color in a rainbow palette. I set my