I’ve added a new tiny foundation paper pieced pattern to my collection! Tiny House was created a little by accident—I was actually making a different design and suddenly had the idea to do a super tiny house with a little flower box outside the window.

Tiny House is very beginner friendly (the pattern only has one section! 🙌) and it comes in two size options: 3” x 3” and 6” x 6” (these three tiny houses are the 3” size).

And to make that tiny flower box even cuter, I added some hand embroidered flowers onto the mint house! I used some of my favorite Aurifloss thread and french knots to quickly add some dimension to the tiny quilt block. It creates a big impact with just a little extra work. 🙂 For reference, the mint fabric is Kisses (in Sweet Mint) from Riley Blake Designs and the Aurifloss colors I used are: 2530 (Blossom Pink), 2423 (Baby Pink), 2888 (Fern Green), 1148 (Light Jade), and 2120 (Canary).

You can find the Tiny House foundation paper pieced quilt block pattern in my Etsy shop HERE.

Happy sewing!

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Cricut. The opinions and text are all mine.

Almost exactly ten years ago, I purchased a Cricut Expression on Black Friday. I used it for a couple years to add some flair to my scrapbook pages and birthday invitations. I loved having it for my paper crafts, but as I did scrapbooking less and less, I decided to pass it on to someone else who would use it more. In the years since I’ve given it away, I’ve often thought it would be fun to have a computerized cutting machine again–and especially to try out the more specialized functions like cutting vinyl, iron-on vinyl, window cling, faux leather, and the new infusible ink. Can’t you just imagine all the cool craft projects you could create with the ability to intricately cut those types of materials?!?

I figured over the course of ten years, things could change a whole lot in the realm of electronic cutting machines, and I was eager to try out the new Cricut Explore Air 2. Upon receiving my machine, the first thing I noticed was the color (I mean, I’m a quilter, so I’m allowed to be impressed by the color, right?). There are several color options and I got the gorgeous mint version–so pretty! There are also some handy storage compartments built into the machine to hold tools.

I wanted to immediately get cutting, so I turned to the Cricut Design Space to find a fun design. Just a warning: the Design Space has SO MANY fun designs. My list of items I wanted to make suddenly grew by about twenty. Haha. I ended up finding a fun bat design that would make some fast and fun Halloween decorations (the design I chose is called “Fancy Paper Pumpkins” if you want to find it on Design Space).

The Cricut Explore Air 2 easily connected to my laptop–I just plugged the Cricut cord into the USB port on my laptop and followed the instructions to pair them. I found out later that the Explore Air 2 has bluetooth capability, so you can bet that will be something I’m going to be trying out next! It will be so nice to just send the cutting files to the Cricut without having to connect them by a cord!

I only had 8.5″ x 11″ pieces of black cardstock, so I chose that option on the Design Space “Material Size” drop down menu and the bats from my chosen design automatically adjusted to fit onto an 8.5″ x 11″ piece of paper. For me, that feature is particularly impressive because with my old Cricut, I’d have to manually arrange the figures on the screen to make sure they fit within the size parameters of the cardstock I was using. With the Cricut Design Space, you can also easily adjust the number of figures to cut (copy and paste more figures, or delete to have less) and the size of the designs.

Cutting out the bat figures was a lot faster and smoother than with my old Cricut, too. I could tell the Explore Air 2 had a lot more power and it seemed to effortlessly cut the cardstock. The cut bat pieces were easy enough to remove from the mat, but I would suggest cutting everything you need from the cardstock/paper on the first run, as the left over cardstock ripped a little here and there taking it off of the adhesive mat.

The bat figures that I cut out had scored lines for their wings to help with bending in the right place. I haven’t purchased a scoring tool for my Cricut yet (it’s on my wish list, though), so instead of having the Cricut cut out the scored lines, I just used a ruler with a metal edge to bend the wings in the direction I wanted. Easy, peasy!

My kids helped me place the bats on our wall and they thought it was so fun to have a colony of bats invading our living room. And I thought it was so fun that the project took less than thirty minutes total!

Overall, I am super impressed with my Cricut Explore Air 2. This little bat project was a perfect starting off point and I’m more excited than ever to see what else it can do.

Every month, Aurifil gives a challenge to their Aurifil Artisans. This month, we were challenged to use Aurifloss or 12 wt Aurifil thread on a project. I use 50 wt Aurifil thread pretty much every time I sew, but am much less familiar with the thicker Aurifil options, so I was excited to gain a little experience with a different weight thread. 🧵

I decided to mix these yummy wool felt colors from Riley Blake Designs with 12 wt Aurifil to create a modern hexie pincushion (inspired by Modern Handcraft’s work). To be honest, I wasn’t quite sure how things would turn out, but I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to use the 12 wt thread! I kept my regular 50 wt Aurifil in the bobbin, kept the same needle and just lowered the tension a bit for the top thread.

The mix of the wool with the thicker stitching gives such a great texture! I’d love to experiment a bit more with wool + 12 wt Aurifil on another project, so don’t be surprised if you see more of this combination from me in the future.

Sometimes you find a print that is so incredibly awesome that you have no choice but to design an entire quilt around it. This black astrophysics print is from the NASA Apollo 11 line by Riley Blake Designs and when I saw it, I knew I needed a quilt centered around this fun graphic fabric. 

Growing up, I was absolutely crazy about all things NASA. I loved science and even ended up getting a bachelor’s degree in Physics with dreams of possibly working for NASA someday. Over the years, I spent many years writing notes and solving problems with figures and equations that looked just like this print! So you can imagine how much I was geeking out over it.

To highlight the astrophysics print. I decided to go with a simple, modern plus quilt. The background is Confetti Cotton Riley White and the backing is Riley Blake Dreamy Minky in Sweet Mint (such a beautiful color!).  The binding is my all-time favorite stripe–Riley Blake’s black and white 1/4″ stripe. I’ve used this exact stripe on too many projects to count! I wanted to tie in the Sweet Mint backing color to the front of the quilt, so I added a small stripe of Riley Blake’s Kisses, also in Sweet Mint (I love that they coordinate colors across different prints and fabrics–it makes it so easy to get an exact match!).

The bold graphic nature of this simple quilt really makes the plus shapes pop and the astrophysics print makes it all the more special. 🙂 

The NASA Apollo 11 line has several other fun prints, so if you have a science, math, or engineering nerd (I use that term fondly) in your life, you’ll definitely want to check this new fabric line out!

Welcome to my stop on the Rainy Day Sewing Book Tour! Rainy Day Sewing is the darling new book from Amy Sinibaldi and Kristyne Czepuryk. The book includes full instructions and colored graphics for a delightful range of objects: quilts, softie dolls, pouches, totes, and more. The photos are inspiring and the projects are full of charm.

I seriously wanted to make all of the projects, but finally settled on the Thimble Basket. I fell in love with the tiny patchwork pieces on the side, hand-stitched binding, and the cute little handle. 

A bundle of blues, tans, and whites I recently purchased from Handmade is Heartmade was the perfect serene color palette and I just had to throw in some light blue plaid from Amy’s Les Petits line for the bottom of the basket.

My copy of Rainy Day Sewing is sure to get a lot of use–after all, there are still seventeen projects left for me to make! 😉

Faith Essenburg and Ange from A Little Patchwork have shared their Rainy Day Book Tour projects on their blogs and you can follow along with the other talented makers with the Book Tour Schedule below.

Happy Sewing!

It’s been so much fun to see everyone who has been participating in the #fallingforfpp sew along over on instagram! I’ve seen a lot of Simple Heart FPP blocks–if you haven’t picked up that free pattern, head on over to the blog post HERE and download it! 

Today, I’m sharing a new foundation paper piecing pattern called Minimalist Trees. This cute pattern has three tree options-small, medium, and large-with two sizes for each tree (3″ x 3″ and 6″ x 6″). That’s six patterns total! And just like the Simple Heart block, the Minimalist Trees are super beginner friendly.

Minimalist Trees FPP Pattern by Center Street Quilts

Click on the link above to download the Minimalist Tree PDF Pattern and remember to post your photos on instagram using the hashtag #fallingforfpp so I can see them!