My New Eye Bowl

Pass the Visine! Here's my new Eye Bowl!

The name is inspired by the orange Tula Pink fabric covering the small diamonds. I drove the point home (because too much is never enough for me) by placing glass eye beads on half the outer shapes. 

It's entirely English Paper Pieced. Before embellishment, it looked like this:

Afterwards, along with the beads and buttons on top, I added danglies below.

 Lower.

 The back: 

Pure fun! I showed a different polygon-based bowl in my last blog entry, here. All my techniques and many more ideas (but not this exact project) are in my polyhedron book, "Stitch-a-hedron"; more information is here. 

My New English Paper Pieced Basket, Roof Optional

Here's my new thing! It's English Paper Pieced canopied basket...


....which can keep the dust off your giant, color-coordinated thread cone...

...or help you find your measuring tape...

Or stuff with faux flowers....

With you inside, it's a bulky bangle bracelet!

...which doubles as a wee, insecure handbag (needs a zippered lining)....

The shape is a modified truncated cuboctahedron. Here's what it would have looked like if it were a complete polyhedron (closed up, without the handle):

Can you see the family resemblance to this stuffed and complete truncated cuboctahedron pincushion?

I made the pincushion for my book, Stitch-a-hedron; English Paper Pieced Polyhederon Gifts and Accessories to Sew.  A complete truncated cuboctahedron contains 6 octagons, 12 squares, and 8 hexagons. On the pincushion, I made each shape in a different color.

For the covered basket, I used a different luscious metallic Klimt-themed quilters' cotton for each outside shape. Inside, I used dupioni silks. The outer shapes are basted around stiff fusible interfacing; for the lining, the fabric is basted around flexible medium-weight interfacing. Here's how the outside (left) and lining (right) looked like before insertion:

Here's the handle, with one end attached to the body of the basket. The final step - stitching the square at the top to the dark hexagonal piece on front - was tricky. 

I'm also thinking that without the handle, I could have put a drawstring bag inside the form (with no handle) to make an evening purse. It would look something like this.

 I'm on a roll with English Paper Pieced polyhedron accessories, mainly because I've been working on a difficult large quilt that required many complicated decisions - polyhedrons, by contrast, are rapid gratification. Last week I made a Valentine's hexagon-and-pentagon EPP dish, here. And another one is coming up soon! More info about my approach and my polyhedron book is here.

Impulse English Paper Pieced Heart Dish

I always get in a Valentine's Day mood at the last minutes. Here's the impulse project I made yesterday, an English Paper Pieced dish that can serve as a pincushion:

...or a thimble holder:

...or maybe an embroidery thread basket....

Or, pile it with chocolates for your sweetie. Here's how I constructed it. There's stiff fusible interfacing inside each piece; both sides are covered with fabric. 

The bowl takes shape when you sew up the side seams. 

Last, I did a bit of embellishment with the variegated embroidery thread in the ball above.

If you'd like to make this project, and you have any kind of hexagon and pentagon templates, you just need one hexagon and six pentagons, each with the same size edges - mine were 1". I redrew the top drawing below into the second drawing, altering the pentagons into soft heart shapes. Each piece is made up of two back-to-back EPPed forms, one with stiff fusible interfacing inside.

By the way, you can also cut this out of one piece of cardstock, for a fun paper project. Score and fold on the lines, instead of cutting the pieces apart.
My step-by-step method for English Paper piecing fabric bowls and other 3D forms - though not this exact project - is in my book, "Stitch-a-hedron, English Paper Piecing Polyhedron Gifts and Accessories to Sew," on etsy in digital form for instant download here; and on Amazon as a paperback, here. Wishing you a sweet holiday!