Hey crew, welcome back! It’s been another quiet, yet productive Wednesday working at my home studio and I can’t say I mind. Once again the rain is coming down like cats and dogs with ice rain in between, so doing anything outdoors is 100% out of the question. No biggie though, since as we all know the term “inclement weather” is just a fancy way of saying stitching weather. If there’s one thing I think we can all agree on is you can never have too many days designated for stitch therapy. It’s always just what the doctor ordered – especially with so much going on between both the shop and retreat house this week! We have several retreat guests staying with us as we speak, with a bunch more checking in over the weekend. In fact, after my friend Vegas Val shows up with her mob this coming Monday, we’ll officially have a full house! Exciting to say the least and a bit overwhelming at times, so a little time away from it all before things really get wild is always nice.
While tidying up around the studio earlier, it occurred to me that it’s been about a month since I’ve talked about what I consider to be my favorite things in the quilting and sewing world. These include different sewing notions and quilting hacks that I feel like at this point in my quilting career I simply can’t live without… and think you should know about too! Unfortunately, I got away from doing that last year since we opted out of celebrating our usual 12 Days of Christmas like we have in the past. I’ve missed talking about the little things that make me happy in my quilting life, so I figured why not reawaken that idea? My goal is to feature one or two of my favorite things each month so that I can not only share the tricks I find to be efficient and time saving, but also to get feedback from all of you on what you think of them as well.
This time around I want to talk about something you might not necessarily consider to be a quilting tool, but I beg to differ! I love planning out my quilt blocks and appliqué designs ahead of time by coloring them in with colored pencils on paper first. That way I can experiment with the various ways they could look without actually setting anything in stone. That’s where this next item comes in… I’m sure you’ve heard of the art supply brand, “Prismacolor“ at some point in your life. They just so happen to produce my most favorite set of colored pencils of all time – the “Prismacolor Premier Colored Pencils“ collection.
I bought this set and absolutely adore all the lightfast, richly saturated color options it comes with – very similar to my fabrics and wools! The box contains 150 premium colored pencils with soft, thick cores that are perfect for shading and shadows. These pencils are ultra smooth and feature thick, robust, leads that resist cracking and chipping. Vivid and intense in one stroke, yet soft in the next, these pencils do justice to any project you use them on. I love them! Want a set for yourself? Click the button below to get yours now!
The other item I want to talk about today that I would truly miss if I didn’t have one is my Daylight Wafer 3 LED Lightbox. As you know light boxes are simple and straight forward devices used to accurately trace an image onto another surface. Perfect for on-the-go artists of all kinds, this ultra thin, ultra light (only 9lbs!), and ultra easy to transport lightbox features fully dimmable LED lights for a bright, even spread of illumination from edge to edge with true color matching illumination for accurate viewing. The Wafer is not only ideal for quilting, but is also perfect for calligraphy, stenciling, scrapbooking, embossing, quilting, embroidery, sewing, and sew much more!
