Tag Archives: Tula Pink

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Last Fall I watched as hundreds of quilters participated in the Tula Pink City Sampler quilt along hosted on Instagram by Angie of Gnome Angel. Among others, I drooled over my friend Liz's blocks. So, when Angie was gearing up for another round, I knew I had to dive in. I knew I wanted to use my Tula Pink fabric stash. And I knew this quilt will be for me. I started by choosing a palette and pulled my Tula prints and Kona solids that were mainly green, blue or purple (with hints of pink).

Starting on May 7, participants started making one 6" block a day... we'll post the last block in the book on August 14. Participants are allowed to work ahead, but to be eligible for prizes we must post each block on the correct day (in our own time zone). The first couple weeks of blocks are all cross blocks. I'm really enjoying working with the Tula fabric and fussy cutting the cute critters. Here are my first seven blocks.

See all the blocks I've made on Instagram at #sgq100blocks and check out everyone's blocks at #100days100blocks2017.

Check out my week 2 blocks.

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I've made it through another one week quilt challenge. And I'm not even posting about it at the very last minute! There are eleven whole hours until the deadline. This week's challenge was "Carolina Lily." Let me back up a little first. I follow Leasa on Instagram and love her Sew My Stash inspiration. (Side note: I've purchased no fabric in 2017.) She posted recently about using the good stuff and issued her first 2017 Sew My Stash challenge to use our coveted fabric. So, last week, before the Project QUILTING prompt was announced, I declared that whatever it was, I would use my Tula Pink fabric. It's the collection of fabric that goes most untouched in my stash. Okay, back to the challenge. The Carolina Lily is a beautiful orange flower. It's also the inspiration for a very traditional quilt block of the mid-19th century. First thing was first, I chose some fabrics from the Tula pile. The most obviously chose was this print from The Birds & the Bees. I love that it reminds me of the speckled pattern on the Carolina Lily.

I used appliqué in my last challenge and was determined to not go that route this time. I debated an improv pieced Carolina Lily, but in the end I decided to traditionally piece the block. Except that I redesigned it to only have one tricky inset seam. (Photo below.) Here's my initial fabric pull. I added some Alison Glass fabrics to the project, because I love her fabric and Quilting Jetgirl is hosting an Alison Glass challenge this month, too! So there we have it, three challenges in one little mini quilt!

I would have loved to make a larger, scrappier quilt that encompassed more of these fabrics, but it's a one week challenge and I'm also working on three other quilts at the moment. I had to simplify. My final piece featured two Tula prints (the above print and the green print), two Alison Glass prints (orange print and the grey background) and a Kona solid. My center block is 5" finished. Here's the inset seam and the finished block.

With borders the quilt finished at about 7" x 7". It's quilted with Aurifil 50 wt. #1133 (Burnt Orange), #1114 (Grass Green), and #2605 (Grey).

And the back.

P.S. Three years ago today, I posted my first blog post. I've had such a wonderful time and I've met so many lovely people throughout this journey. I'm celebrating by kicking off my pattern writing business, starting a newsletter, and a couple other upcoming blog changes. Thank you all for visiting!

I'm linking up to Project Quilting 8.2, Quilting Jetgirl Alison Glass Challenge, and Sew My Stash 2017 First Challenge (via IG).

Project QUILTING online voting will begin Sunday 1/22 around 11am PST.  There are over 70 projects linked up so far. Check out these beautiful quilts and vote for your favorites. (Mine is #72.)

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In November, I shipped off my Schnitzel and Boo Swap package. My partner, Margaret, told me that she likes interesting animals. And she had some Tula Pink in her inspiration mosaic. I immediately knew that I had to do something to feature a purple Tula raccoon and had a great time pulling Tula fabric to coordinate.

Margaret also had a stripey 8-point star in her mosaic, so I decided to design my own 8-point star with an octagon in the middle. I used EQ7 to create my paper pieced segments to go around my octagon and fussy cut the raccoon to fit in the middle. Of course, adding eight segments around an octagon created y-seams. Now, I don't know the "proper" way to go about this, so I'll tell you the "how I just made it up" way.

Once I had pieced all 8 outer sections (and leaving the paper on), I attached each of them to the center octagon only. Then I went back and pieced the seams connecting the segments. Two demerits for not changing to white thread for those white to white seams. :-/ Overall, I'm really happy with the process and result. Then came the quilting.

Sometimes I have this thing about not wanting to quilt on top of some part of my design to not detract from the pretty, pretty fabric. Yeah, I need to get over that. This time, I decided to just quilt the white background and chose graffiti quilting. I started with an M for Margaret in the lower right. I was a little rusty, but I did a little graffiti doodling to warm up and then jumped it. I'm looking forward to doing some graffiti quilting on a larger quilt, using a larger scale, but I really love the look of the dense quilting on this mini.

I attached my lazy mini quilt label to the back with fusible before quilting. I figure a wall hanging won't be washed much, so it works. I was so happy to send it off to Margaret and am so glad she loved it!

 

Here's the awesome mini I received from Melissa for the swap. I like to encourage my swap partners to try something new and to make something they love. I was so excited to receive this beautiful mini! I love that it's not something I would have made myself. Just look at all those awesome curves! And the amazing quilting! I found the perfect place for it next to our colorful wedding ketubah in our dining room. Score! (P.S. I really need to change the quilt on the right to be another colorful 24" mini instead of this smaller one.) All the extras she sent were so thoughtful as well. A lovely zipper pouch, fun office supplies, chocolate, and neat wind up toys for the kids and I to enjoy. Thank you again, Melissa!

(Pardon the wonky shadow from the light fixture. ;-))

Thank you for visiting!

I'm linking up to Finish It Friday, TGIFF at Quokka Quilts, Fabric Frenzy Friday, Link-a-Finish FridayNeedle and Thread Thursday and Adrienne's 2015 Q4 Finish Along post. See all my Q4 goals here.