Tag Archives: improv blocks

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In August, Emily pointed us to Bow Bridge in Central Park at spring sunny day by Helen Denisevich for our color inspiration. She asked us to choose two color groupings inspired by the vibrant colors in the watercolor and ink painting. She wanted a 12" x 12" block with a small section of one color group surrounded by the second color group. Any improv we'd like!

I loved the greens in the painting, ranging from yellow-greens into blue-greens, so I pulled fabric for that to be one of my groupings. Then I focused on the pinks in the tree and chose a variety of pinks, light to dark.

My finished block is approximately 12" x 12". The pink section in the center was informed by the shape of my scraps, starting with the largest triangle in the center.

The green section to the left of my center section was informed by scraps that were wedge shaped.

I pieced green strips for the top section, but when that was too boring for me I made a couple vertical slices to insert additional pieced sections.

I love having beautiful, saturated bold colors in a prompt. And the freedom to do any improv pieced we'd like meant that I could just play with the fabric. It was such a joy to create.

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I'm so excited for season 15 of Project QUILTING to be underway.

I pieced my improv bird house and then pivoted to people houses for my improv piecing demo at Northern California Quilt Council this past week. Here's what my design wall looked like last weekend.

I cut out nine more houses during my demos that are stacked up waiting to be sewn. I'm excited to get those together and watch the neighborhood on my design wall grow. I finished my bird house into a mini quilt by adding a fused appliqué circle and free motion quilting.

My quilt is approximately 9" x 8" and is finished with a faced binding. Since I didn't have a bird on the front I chose an Alison Glass print with birds and bees for the back.

Thanks for visiting! I'm linking up on Kim's blog for the Project QUILTING Bird House challenge. Congratulations to everyone else who participated in the challenge this week. Next challenge drops on January 21st.

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This is my submission for the "Just the Top" category of the Pantone Quilt Challenge 2023.

  • Viva Magenta Confetti
  • 32.5" x 32.5"
  • Sarah Goer, USA

I spent 25 days of daily practice building these improv blocks. Then trimmed them all to the same size block. My background fabrics are pinks, oranges, and yellows, including Kona Pomegranate (my Viva Magenta). My strips are all turquoise/aqua in a variety of values. And my corner triangles are mostly greens in light to medium values. I tipped close to yellow with the inclusion of Kona Acid Lime and Kona Limelight.

I'm linking up with "Just the Top" for the Viva Magenta challenge. Thank you to Sarah and Elizabeth for hosting, and to all the judges and sponsors!