It feels like a really long time since I have put out a Colour Inspiration Tuesday Collection. In fact, it is a long time in the life of a blog…. 12 weeks, with Christmas and New Year and two Beary Colourful Bear patterns and all sorts since then!
Since the last Colour Inspiration Tuesday Collection there have been a lot of people come on board with the Beary Colourful BOM and the Monthly Colour Challenge who may not have explored the dim dark past of the Chameleon. I am truly delighted to have you all join us, and I hope you will also enjoy some of the other ideas that I explore here in between the bears.
A quick summary of the ideas behind Colour Inspiration Tuesday Collection 5…..
Welcome back to Colour Inspiration Tuesday! Today we are exploring a new FMQ mini tutorial “She’ll be Apples”.
Last week I was suddenly inspired to quilt my next charity quilt. I’ve had the pinned quilt in my possession since before Christmas, but I always knew it wasn’t going to get touched until January. Partly because December is a ridiculously busy time of year, and partly because it wasn’t “speaking to me”. In fact, it was confusing me slightly…. apples and roses on one side, autumn leaves, nuts and berries on the other. I quite like both sides, but struggled to choose one quilting theme to make sense of this quilt.
Here is the charity quilt before quilting….. I nominated it as my January One Monthly Goal.
After musing over this quilt for some time, on and off, and getting it out several times and putting it away again, inspiration finally struck. I was in a right-brain kind of mood and scrolling through photos on Unsplash over a coffee when I spotted the picture of apples I have used on today’s mood board. And it all somehow just fell into place. I *just knew* I had to quilt apples, but not just any apples. Apples with a little bit of cheeky thrown in!
The “She’ll be Apples” FMQ Motif
I grabbed a piece of paper and a pen and started doodling. First I started with a continuous line apple motif.
Then I thought, what if the apple has a bite taken out of it? Well, that’s easy.
And it’s no more trouble to take several bites, is it?
But what if the apple has a worm in it? A friendly worm, of course!
And of course, I couldn’t resist…… The worm and the bite combination! This one’s for my daughter, who is at that age where one of her favourite jokes is “What’s worse than finding a worm in your apple?” “Half a worm…..” Hahahaha Snort. Oh the joys of childhood! Anyway, I was mostly well behaved….. I only put this combo on the quilt once. And I did overrule my daughter’s request for the apple and half a worm motif…..
She’ll be Apples Quilting in Real Life
Here are some pics of the quilting up close, and of the little charity quilt all done. Sorry, the quilting does not show well – which is exactly how I wanted the quilt to be, but it is excruciating to try to photograph.
Apple FMQ motifThe apple with a bite FMQ motifApple core motifThe apple with a friendly worm motifAnd the one instance of an apple with both a worm and a bite
It didn’t take very long to quilt this little lap quilt. Once I had got the hang of the basic apple shape, I found quilting these to be quite quick and easy. In fact, I had the whole thing finished before I realised that there is another apple variation that I could have added. The half apple. No matter, I will save this idea for another day.
If you would like to give the apple motifs a go, I have made you a printable reference page, which you can download here: She’ll be Apples pdf
And here is the finished quilt. The quilting has made it crinkly and cuddly. 🙂
So, that’s my January One Monthly Goal done and dusted! I promised you I’d had a lot of fun with it!
I hope you have enjoyed this little project and might put some apples on a quilt soon. My daughter is currently requesting apples on the Regatta Quilt I am making for her. Yes, complete with a half-worm apple. It’s not what I had in mind at all……. the big question is…. “How old will she be before such a thing becomes “cringe-worthy”?” The Regatta Quilt is supposed to take her forward into her teens. Then again, maybe I should just do it. Kids are not young for very long. are they? And there’ll be plenty more quilts. Thankfully there is still some thinking time on this until I get to the quilting stage of the Regatta Quilt. I’ll see what she thinks when I actually get that far.
P.S. Photo Credits
The photo which sparked the apple motifs was supplied for free by Marina Khrapova via Unsplash. You can find this photo, as well as many others I have used for Colour Inspiration Tuesdays here. They are all available for free for you to use in your own projects however you wish.
Would you like to keep in touch with Clever Chameleon and the fun quilty ideas I design as well as find all over the internet? You can follow directly for email updates, or through Bloglovin’, Pinterest or FB. All your follow options can be found here.
One final FMQ design for 2017 – Water and Hibiscuses (a mini tutorial)
As we rapidly approach the end of the year, I am trying to get the Vanuatu Turtle Quilt done and dusted. One less UFO to carry over to the New Year!
Vanuatu Turtle Quilt top finished at our last check in
So I have used my free time this week, such as it was(!) to piece a backing for this quilt, layer and pin it up and design the quilting.
The backing I pieced for the Vanuatu Turtle QuiltI don’t normally pin at this density….. but some of the fabrics in this quilt are not quilting cottons and have some stretch. I wanted everything to be super secure.
To complete this quilt, I knew I wanted to quilt something curvy……. waves or such like to contrast with the geometric black and white piecing and to evoke thoughts of water. But it needed to be subtle. The black and white graduation in the piecing and the red turtle appliqué are enough major design elements for one quilt. So, quilt something curvy in lightweight grey thread……
I was originally thinking spirals of some description, but as I was piecing the backing, I decided that the hibiscuses on the back were simple enough to become FMQ designs.
The hibiscus motif that is repeated continuously in the main black and white fabric used in the backing.
Working up the Hibiscus FMQ design
My first attempts at drawing the hibiscuses out with a pencil were appalling…..
Not good….. misshapen clover leaves, anyone?Repeated attempts became better…. better petals, better stamens, better line flow.Eventually I got a formula for a single line hibiscus that I liked. Here it is traced out.
At this stage I was still thinking to pair this hibiscus FMQ with swirls, when I decided that perhaps that was going to get complicated and busy, when I expressly wanted simple. So I opted to go with a design I do relatively often which is kind of a sideways elongated stipple…… and looks a bit like the gentle wavy surface of slowly moving water. I’m sure many of you do it too. Like this……
Water and Hibiscus FMQ design
I have started quilting this design onto the Vanuatu Turtle quilt. It is hard to photograph though, as it recedes into the quilt. Only to be observed by the most up-close and observant users. As per the original plan. 🙂
Hibiscus FMQ designHibiscus FMQ with “water”
So, if you would like to try this hibiscus FMQ design, here it is broken down into steps for you.
Step 1
Quilt into an open space. Double back to quilt a heart shape. Do not quite close the shape.
Step 2
Repeat the heart shape to create four more petals. The petal shapes can be fairly uneven, as long as they adhere to the rough heart shape and return almost but not right to the centre. The five points at the bases of the petals should sit in a small ring formation.
Step 3
Quilt a hooked stamen into the space defined by the first petal.
Step 4
Create one or two more hooked stamens in the second petal and some flatter stamens in the lower petals. Exit the flower between any two petals.
You can download all the steps on a one page pdf here: hibiscus.
I hope you enjoy trying the Water and Hibiscus FMQ motifs at some point, perhaps in 2018. And I would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a safe and happy Christmas holiday.
Gonna Finish This Sucker! One Monthly Goal with Elm Street Quilts
To be honest, this month I already have a couple of quilt and crafty deadlines. Firstly, I have to make some reasonable progress on my Vanuatu turtle quilt so I can link up with the Splash of Color quilt along. By now the schedule says I should have about half my blocks sewn. Hahahahahaha! Okay……..
And secondly, I have a Christmas ornament tutorial to get prepared for you by the 16th. Thankfully, this project is progressing more or less on time to date. I will be sharing it in the 2017 Ornament Exchange. If you like making your own Christmas ornaments, you most certainly do not want to miss this blog hop! 47 projects are lined up this year. It’s gonna be huge!
So what to nominate for November?
My November OMG quilt
But I feel it would be cheating to nominate either of these projects for the Elm Street One Monthly Goal, because they have to be finished anyway. So, for my November OMG I am nominating a charity quilt currently in my possession. It is not large, so it really should only take me a coupe of sessions to quilt. I didn’t piece it, I have just been entrusted to quilt it. This little quilt is very pretty in pinks and greens, and I want to try my allover strawberry vines FMQ design on it. It would be great for the charity to have it back by the end of the month.
So, thank you Elm Street OMG and you, dear readers, for keeping me accountable and motivated. With any luck, someone in need will have this quilt before Christmas.
Do you have a quilt goal for November? If you do, share it with us here in the comments below. And consider joining us at Elm Street Quilts for some accountability (and be in the running for a prize as well!).
Colour Inspiration Tuesday: weekly colour stories for your quilts and other crafts.
Have you ever taken the time to really look at something you had always assumed you knew well, only to discover something unexpected? We live such fast lives these days that the little details can start to slip by. At least, that is true for my stage of life, with 2 young children and a travelling husband. But today I stopped to “smell the bougainvilleas” and discovered something.
Nope, it wasn’t that bougainvilleas have a fainter scent than many flowers. Or that the bright leaves that surround the tiny flowers are indeed leaves, not petals. I did already know both of those things. 🙂 It was something more subtle.
The photo of the hot pink bougainvillea at the top of this post was taken at our accommodation in Vanuatu a few weeks ago. At the time, I made a colour board and noticed the pretty form of the tiny flower in the centre of the showy leaves. “Funny”, I thought. “How come I’ve never noticed how cute the little centres are?” I even toyed a little with a free-motion quilting design to celebrate my discovery, but it never really got very far.
And the bougainvilleas went by the wayside as other inspiration presented itself for my 31 day series.
But now we are home, and I find that the local council has repainted the local outdoor pool surrounds. In colours not unlike the tones of the Vanuatu bougainvillea, but with a powder blue thrown in for good measure. I would show you but I keep forgetting my camera when we go to the pool. Anyhow, the new pool décor reminded me of my bougainvillea colour board and I thought I would take another look.
The bougainvillea surprise
Since we have a huge bougainvillea just outside our back door, I also thought I should make a colour board of the that one too. Just for some extra material. Our bougainvillea is in full bloom now. It is the rampant purple variety that grows well in a lot of climates. But when I went to take photos, I noticed something more. The centres of the purple variety actually do not have the charm of the pink one. Their basic construction is the same but there is very little definition between the petals. “Ahhh ha! The purple and pink bougainvilleas are more different than I realised”.
And all this noticing of something I had long taken for granted finally spawned a bougainvillea FMQ idea that might actually work….. bougainvillea flowers.
Stages in quilting the bougainvillea flower
I could immediately launch into the next flower, like pearls on a string. This would work to fill borders and other long thin spaces. I don’t think it matters how many petals fit around the circle, as long as there are 4-6 sets of one long and one short petal.
I also thought I could return and add leaves to the string to make a wider border in a second quilting run. Something like this:
String of bougainvillea flowers with leaf triplets to fill a wider border.
It will take a bit of refining, but I think I could quilt this.
I hope you like the little bougainvillea-inspired FMQ design. Next time I need a warm-up at my Sweet Sixteen I am going to have a go at this one.
Today’s post doubles as my daily Everyday Quilt Inspiration offering. See you for more Everyday Quilt Inspiration fun tomorrow. In the meantime, if you haven’t been following along, you can find the start of this 31 day series here. Only one week left until the daily writing challenge is over! Amazing.
P.S. I was honoured to have a 
To be honest, this month I already have a couple of quilt and crafty deadlines. Firstly, I have to make some reasonable progress on my 
The photo of the hot pink bougainvillea at the top of this post was taken at our accommodation in Vanuatu a few weeks ago. At the time, I made a colour board and noticed the pretty form of the tiny flower in the centre of the showy leaves. “Funny”, I thought. “How come I’ve never noticed how cute the little centres are?” I even toyed a little with a free-motion quilting design to celebrate my discovery, but it never really got very far.
