Greetings fellow sewing enthusiasts! I bet a bunch of you are elbow deep in holiday gifts; I finished early this year and am excited (and a bit trepidacious) about beginning the foundation paper piecing opus that is The Matriarch by Verushka Zarate.

If you aren’t familiar with Zarate’s patterns you’re really missing out. She is not only an excellent, well spoken teacher and demonstrator but, she has to be a stone cold GENIUS engineer to put these beauties together. This elephant will measure 45” square upon completion.

This endeavor is not for anyone impatient. The prep on this project will take far longer to do than the sewing, I suspect. If you take her online class in FPP (highly recommend as it is excellent and packed with pro tips) you find out quickly that, just as in baking or cooking, prep will make or break you. Being highly organized with your materials and machine prep (clean, lube if applicable, wind some bobbins, lay out your tools, get your iron and ironing area ready, new needle, and prepare to go to your most zen state of mind, being in the moment, unhurried and unconcerned with completion. Close attention to every detail will be important so focus, focus, focus.

There are 30 pages of instructions and 65 pages of pieces to be cut, many of which need to be glued together prior to sewing. I began my cutting of the paper pieces today. Here is what my table looked like half way through.

Having a paper cutter saves time and handwork. I took a break to jump on my Peloton, shower, make, eat, and clean up dinner. I intend to approach this project in bites, relaxing through as much of it as is possible. The cutting took me about three hours in all. I began glueing some of the A sections tonight.

I’ve done a fair amount of FPP this year but nothing of this size or scale. My largest FPP to date is a swan and I believe she’s about 20” square before adding a border.

As you can see, The Matriarch is going to be an opus for me. I’ll do more assembling of the paper pieces over the next few days and then figure out how I’m going to starch all 31 colors of fabric in the kit, keeping them in order and attaching their color code stickers to them. I have a garment rack I may bring into my sewing room to hang all of the fabrics so they’re all close by and organized. To be honest, it’s the starching (another key pro tip from Verushka) and drip drying that intimidates me. It’s going to take a lot of time but I’ve used her methods on my smaller FPP projects and it really makes a difference in your final product.

So wish me luck and tune in again if you want to follow my experience with this elephant. I think she’s gorgeous and hope to do her justice.

~Dana~