I have finally finished the quilt, I have been working on for my Mum. Making something for someone you love has been very humbling experience. Even more so, since my mum (as mentioned previously) has a brain tumor and currently undergoing Chemotherapy. This quilt “Daughter’s Love”, I hope will bring her comfort as I can not be with her.

The original design was inspired by the crosses/pluses that are in the stained glass window of a Scottish Castle.

I thought the plus blocks in the original design looked a little heavy, so I removed two of the corners. Alternating the direction, also gave this great secondary square design.

While I love the color palette in the original design, I decided to change it to suit my Mum more. Her favorite colors are orange and purple, hence the final colors of orange, purple, yellow, coral/peach, and magenta.  There are 98 different colored prints used, 20 white on neutral prints for the background with 4 neutral solids.

For the backing I used Tula Pink’s wide back print, Free Fall. It worked as such a great complementary print to the front of the quilt.

I decided that, I didn’t want to continue the squares and lines with the quilting, so a spiral design it was. Little did I realize it would take a huge ~120 hours for the quilting but I love the end result. Thanks to everyone in the Instagram community that encouraged me through this 🙂 One of the other design decisions, was starting the spiral quilting in an off centered location, which just happened to be one of my favorite combinations of prints. The spiral quilting was 1/2″ lines using Aurifil #2021.

In this close-up of the quilting center you can also see the use of some of the white on neutral prints.  The binding was not as easy a decision as I thought it would be. I was trying a dark orange but it did not work. I landed up using a coral based print with orange stripes (Carolyn Friedlander).

I will be releasing the pattern (pdf) for this quilt,  in various sizes, August 8th via my payhip shop. All sales, in the first month, will be donated to Cancer Society, New Zealand who help provide services to my Mum including accommodation while she was having treatment away from home.

Details

Name: Daughter’s Love
Design: Designed by me
Fabric: 98 different colored prints, 20 white on neutral prints, 4 Kona solid neutrals
Backing: Tula Pink Free Fall wideback
Binding: Carolyn Friedlander, Carkai, Grid Diamond in Creamsicle Metallic
Dimensions: 70″ x 70″
Quilted: Spiral design, 1/2″ spacing, Aurifil #2021

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What do you get when you are inspired by succulents and Bauhaus designs?? This is what came out of my quilt design a day exercise.

I love this color palette as it is somewhat outside of my comfort zone as many of the colors are muted.

When discussing with the wonderful Alice from Love Patchwork and Quilting, on submissions, she asked if it would be possible to take this initial design and make a 3 part pillow set. I was so excited about the idea, and thought it would be great. The second design was pretty quick and the third took about 2 weeks, but it was so worth it as I love how all three came out.

This month two of the three designs, are now available in issue 34 of Love Patchwork and Quilting, which was released today (digital format).

The process of making these into pillows was really a great new experience. These designs are super complex for such a small space. I did make the first design a Euro style pillow size 26″ as it really couldn’t easily translate any smaller.  This original design did not make it into the magazine but I am working on making the pattern available soon.

The other two designs, inspired by this one, were somewhat simplified and worked great as a 20″ pillow. Love Patchwork and Quilting does such a great job of staging – look at this second design. The design picks up on the triangular negative space within the center of the above design and the triangle border.

[Photo Credit: Love Patchwork and Quilting]

The third design, focuses on the mix of the lines and the smaller triangles nested in the larger triangle and border.[Photo Credit: Love Patchwork and Quilting]

I love the pillow backs, I used Heather Givens, grey succulents fabric which is still available online at my LQS – Cary Quilting Company.

Details

Name: Abstract Trio
Design: Designed by me
Fabric: Kona Cotton – Silver, White, Seafoam, Sweet Pea, Pesto, Amethyst, Dusty Peach
Backing Fabric: Grey Succulents, Heather Givens
Dimensions: 20″ x 20″
Quilted: Straight Line quilting, Aurifil #2420 Light Pink 50 wt

There are some other amazing projects in this issue, so I hope you take a look, available today via digital release (arrives in the US in 4-6 weeks).

I recently attended Sewtopia in Atlanta. You could choose to participate in a fabric challenge – in this case it was using Michael Miller fabrics. I decided I would use the 3 solids and 1 of the prints ( the four most right) in my quilt. I also added 3 additional Cotton Couture; the blue, green, orange for a pop-art feeling.

I decided that my Treehouse  Ladder Design would be great to play with the these bright fabrics. This was one of my designs from Quilt Design a Day.

I loved how it turned out, especially the balance of color. I made a couple of design changes:

• Worked on color placement and decided to add white.
• Decided that the print was too overpowering for the solids and decided to just use partial pops of the print.
• Added additional ladders in column 4 and flipped column 5.
• Deciding on black striped binding, in line with the pop art feel

I had an interesting time with the back as I made two of them. My first make will now be a quilt as it didn’t seem quite right for this one and could easily hold its own as a front. It’s a large improvisation Log Cabin block

I simplified the back using a simple improve strip with left over Grey Cotton Couture I had from a previous quilt.

The quilting was to echo the ladders both vertically and horizontally. I used invisible thread (premium sulky invisible thread), as there was no good color that matched the bright color palette of this quilt.  Additionally, I added 5 quilted detail areas in light grey Aurifil  thread, to add interest (example: top left).

This quilt will be donated to our Guild’s (Triangle MQG) Charity.

Details

Name: Treehouse Ladders
Design: Designed by me
Fabric: Michael Miller Cotton Couture and Valencia, Color Play Blue, Laura Gunn
Binding: Michael Miller, Stripes, Clown Stripe in White
Dimensions: 42″ x 42″
Quilted: Straight Line quilting, Premium Sulky Invisible thread, FMQ, Aurifil light Grey 50 wt

Linking up for Finish it up Friday with Amanda Jean over at Crazy Mom Quilts.