From the Sewing Room: Vanuatu Turtle Quilt Progress
At last check-in
Well, it’s been a while since I’ve updated you on the quilt that I am doing for the Splash of Color Quilt Along at Busy Hands Quilts. I have been slightly distracted with the homemade ornament blog hop and a few other small projects. They’ve been lots of fun, but I must admit, it’s really nice to get back to quilt making again.
In a nutshell, my plan is to make a quilt with fabrics predominately from Vanuatu. The intention is that this quilt will be a memento of our family’s visit there earlier this year. It will also double as a TV snuggle rug and protection for the couch from the cat. This is roughly what I’m aiming for:
My Vanuatu Turtle Quilt design for the Black and White and Splash of Color QAL
So, the progress report….
Now I have all the components prepared for my quilt top. I have sewn the centre blocks from my last check-in together.
And I have sewn up four border strips.
It would have been quicker and simpler without the assistance……
You can’t prove anything…..
Now all that remains is to combine these pieces with a red strip border to create the flimsy. And then it will be time to add the appliqué. 🙂
Short and sweet this week!
If it’s part of your heritage, I hope you had a special Thanksgiving. And wishing everyone a great week ahead as we enter Advent. My kids are eagerly anticipating the hanging of the Advent quilt (aka the candy-pockets quilt)! Do you have any Advent or Christmas quilts that will be making their seasonal appearance soon? I’d love to hear from you!
Colour Inspiration Tuesday: Real life inspiration for quilts and crafts
This week has been a little hectic here, so there’s been very little sewing time for me. There was a fair bit of secret Christmas crafting, which I am excited to be able to share with you on Thursday, but no quilting. I’ve been creating for the Christmas Ornament Exchange and tutorial blog hop coming up this week…. Stay tuned, it’s going to be huge!
One of the main reasons why it’s been a slow week here is that I went on a two-day camp in the local hills with my young son. This past weekend was the South Australian Hoporee camp at Woodhouse. This camp is the state level Joey Scout adventure that happens only once every two years. A very action-packed weekend for nearly 1,000 people (children, parents and leaders), and one of the highlights of the Joey Scout calendar.
Here’s just a very small taste of what the Joeys (6&7 year olds) got up to with the support of their parents and Scout Leaders……
A taste of archery…..A bit of rock climbing…..Each Joey made paper poppies to add to this banner to commemorate Remembrance Day on Nov 11.A big ball pit….Treasure hunting in a pool of slime….Reinventing the wheel….Recording the things that matter.
All in the midst of the beautiful Adelaide Hills, in amongst the koalas, pobblebonk frogs and kookaburras.
Koalas have Joeys…. so I guess they are allowed on camp.
Colour Inspiration Tuesday: English Broom
As well as the ample wildlife (that seemed surprising unperturbed by the sudden influx of 1,000 people), there were also some notable spring flowers about. While we were on a rest break I spotted a medium-sized bush with stunning yellow and red pea flowers…… So I took pictures of that too, thinking it would make an fabulous colour board for Tuesday. Which I hope you will agree, it most certainly does.
But I have to admit that I was also highly disappointed when I did some research yesterday and found out that this plant is an invasive noxious weed in Australia (and according to Wikipedia, also parts of the US, and New Zealand, and India).
This naughty but beautiful plant is commonly known as English Broom, Scotch Broom or Common Broom. The scientific name is Cytisus scoparius. Most often the flowers are plain yellow…. which well describes the other bushes I saw at the campsite. But there are also several multi-coloured hybrids that have naturalised, and this particular bush was showing off big-time!
I am not sure what I will do with this vivid red, green and yellow colour scheme. I had thought a true-to-life pea flower appliqué would be nice, but the noxious invasive weed thing has taken the shine off that idea. At least for now. In reality, English Broom is not a bad plant – just not welcome here. Perhaps the best place for it is on a quilt or cushion after all! I’ll have to muse over this one for a while.
In the meantime…
Wishing you all a lovely week, and hope to see you back here on Thursday. I will have for you a tutorial on how to make the Christmas tree ornament I dreamed up for my 2017 Ornament Exchange partner. I am paired up with the very talented Evija of the award winning From Evija with Love blog. How lucky am I? Anyway, there will be links to 46 other ornament tutorials from around the world on this hop. All on Thursday! You’ll be sure to find something you will want to make!
Vanuatu Turtle Quilt: Design process, warts and all.
In the last few days I have finally had a chance to get back into the sewing room. And I have to admit it was very therapeutic. I have missed sewing. So has our cat. I swear he is addicted as I am!
My goal this week was to design and sew the blocks for my black, white and red Vanuatu Turtle quilt for the Splash of Color Quilt Along. I started with this basic plan…
And these fabrics…..
If you wish, you can read more about the what and why of my original plans, and see my turtle appliqué pieces all cut, waiting for a quilt top.
So, on Thursday, I started on the quilt top. I looked at my plan. I cut six 6½ squares. And I went off script.
That might be a record, even for me!
Changing my mind….
Firstly, I decided that I wanted to add in a very dark, plain fabric behind the bulk of the turtle appliqué. Plainer than any fabric I have brought home from Vanuatu. I did actually look for a mostly black fabric in Vanuatu, but there wasn’t any to be had.
So, I went hunting among my scraps here at home and found an Australian Aboriginal print in black called Sand Dunes. The Sand Dunes scraps are leftover from the backing of a dear friend’s quilt. It is very soft and colourfast – an amazing piece of fabric to work with. So I added it to the mix. I also found some black 2½” pre-cut strips inherited from another friend. Perfect for extra darkness behind the appliqué.
Dark corner for the turtle appliqué background. Sand Dunes is the black with the dotted wavy lines through it.
Changing my mind, again…
Although I had a 5×5 grid drawn up for my colour gradient in the quick diagram above, I had actually intended to do an 8×8 grid of 6″ squares. Some fussy cut whole squares and some pieced squares to get a black and white gradient. That is why I started by cutting 6½ squares of each Vanuatu fabric.
However, I quickly realised that 6″ squares of pinwheels and HSTs in these prints is going to result in a very. busy. quilt. Which would be fine, except that this was supposed to be the background for my appliquéd turtle. And it was also going to take waaaay too long to construct.
So, I decided that my mockup was trying to tell me something – that I should have 5×5 8″ finished blocks. I cut some new 8½” squares, and recycled the 6½” squares into 8½ squares by adding 2½” strips on two sides. This had the added bonus of being an easy way to graduate through colour values and tie the blocks together visually.
Building up the Vanuatu Turtle Quilt
And again…
As I started on the more intricately pieced blocks, I decided that I needed some more solid or solid-like fabrics. Specifically in the grey range. Somewhere for the eyes to rest from the prints. I had already included a blue-grey hand-dye and a white solid in my original fabric choices. Now I added two grey Shadow Play fabrics from my scraps. I only had enough of the dark grey Shadow Play for 4 pieces. But that is half the fun, making do. 🙂
More progress on the turtle quilt
And again…
At this point it was time for me to head out to the South Australian Quilters’ Guild evening meeting. I’m glad I got this far before I had to go, because I was beginning to heed the little voice that said I needed to add a nearly white fabric. There were no nearly white fabrics in Vanuatu, just as there were no nearly black ones. I had thought that I might get by with fussy cutting. Or using the reverse side of a fabric. But…
At the Guild meetings there is always a shop stall, and in the end I picked up something to round out my fabric choices. Actually I picked up two somethings. One was a white fabric with a fine black print. It had slightly more black than I wanted, but it was the best pick available. I was happy at least that the swirls on the print are consistent with the patterns already in my quilt. 🙂 The second purchase was a fat quarter of a dark blue-grey Grunge that happens to be the exact same colour as the blue grey on two of the Vanuatu fabrics. Score!
Finishing off the design
A little more playing and switching fabrics around and I settled on this layout (with a few more tweaks as I sewed).
Nearly finished. You can probably guess who disturbed my nice tidy layout…..Somebody who thinks he is invisible siiting here…..
And now I have finished sewing up the 8½” blocks for my Vanuatu Turtle quilt. They are ready to be assembled into a quilt top and have borders attached.
Vanuatu Turtle quilt blocks finished and ready for assemblyHappy with my pile of blocks
So, how am I feeling? Well, I really love this quilt top so far. I think the design is actually quite effective as it is. A small part of me even thinks that I should claim the grey-blue as my “Splash of Color” and leave it really simple. Because there is a whisper of a question in my head as to whether it will marry well with my appliqué. Despite all the changes I have made, it is still very busy.
But the whole point of this quilt is the turtle appliqué….. And if I stop now this quilt top will be too small to be particularly useful, and my turtle appliqué will be orphaned. So I will push on. If, in the end, it isn’t as fantastic as I envisioned, then I won’t mind it going on the couch, right?! And there is always something to be learned in quilts that don’t quite make it to awesome. Fingers crossed that I am just over analysing things and it will be just fine!
If you are also participating in the Splash of Color Quilt Along I hope that you are pleased with your progress so far. If you like black and white quilts and haven’t been over and checked out the progress of the other projects yet, be sure to do that. Everyone has chosen their own project, so this QAL is very interesting, even as a spectator sport. 🙂
P.S. Colour Inspiration Tuesday resumes here tomorrow! Yay!
It’s a ripe quangdong. An Australian native fruit. I took this photo in Arkaroola (a desert oasis in South Australia) in early October, two years ago. Isn’t the fruit glorious looking? And doesn’t it scream Christmas?!!!
Quangdong treeQuangdong seedThe kernel inside
Quangdongs have a thin dry flesh surrounding a large dimpled seed.
The kernel inside the quangdong seed is known as a candle nut. The seed has a high enough oil content that you can light it and it will burn like a candle. Candles also make me think of Christmas. Especially after spending last Christmas in Europe.
Quangdong seed candle
Quangdong flesh is awful to eat raw. However, if you dry quangdong, it magically becomes delicious. You can eat it just as it is, or turn it into jam or pie or whatever you desire. It tastes a little like rhubarb, but less sour. Mmmmm.
Quangdong pie from a café in Quorn
Finding Quilt Inspiration in the Everyday: Day 28
I found my quangdong photos while still looking for the quilt photos I mentioned yesterday. It turns out that looking through old photos is a great way to find quilt inspiration. It happened to me yesterday as well!
Finding these shots is fortuitous. I needed an easy post today, because I have spent all my blogging time playing with ideas for a new Christmas tree decoration instead! I am going to be joining in the Ornament Exchange blog hop in November and I’ve been trying a few things out. So it seems apt that I tell you about my Christmasy quangdong inspiration today.
How was I inspired by the quangdong?
The reason why I took a whole set of photos of quangdongs two years ago was because I thought they would make amazing quilted postcard designs to use as Christmas cards. Especially for my overseas friends.
begging to be a Quangdong Christmas postcard!
Appliqué the fruit and leaf shapes onto postcard sized quilts and then do a stack of fun thread painting over them. Or maybe draw them with Inktense and then thread paint. Sadly I haven’t got around to making the postcards yet, but time has not diminished the desire too. Every time I see these photos I think I must do this project one day.
Do you make quilted postcards? Where do you find your inspiration for them?
Or have you accidentally been inspired to make a quilt while looking through old photos? I would love to hear your stories. 🙂
P..S. If you are new to the 31 Days of Finding Quilt Inspiration series you can now binge read it…. access it through the first post, or follow me on Bloglovin’ to catch up on 4 weeks of everyday quilt inspiration.
P.P..S. You’ll be glad to know, I finally found the quilt photos I was after. I hope to tell you about them tomorrow. Take care until then!
About a month ago I signed up for the Splash of Color quilt along from Busy Hands Quilts. The rules mostly consist of a few deadlines for the quilt stages, and that the colours of the quilt are to be predominately black and white with colour highlights. Apart from that, the direction the quilt takes is up to each quilter.
The fabrics for my Splash of Color quilt inspiration.The colours in our Vanuatu bedroom.
Since that post, we have been back to Vanuatu to continue Paul’s humanitarian telecommunications research. While we were there I acquired more fabrics specifically for this project :). And some more inspiration. I decided to add a little greyed blue or teal to my splash of colour, thanks to the Vanuatu décor in our bedroom.
Here is my final pile of goodies to work from:
The white, grey and teal fabrics are from my stash here at home. The red and black fabrics are all from Vanuatu.
Finding Quilt Inspiration in the Everyday: Day 25
The next challenge in the Splash of Color quilt along was to choose a quilt pattern. Well, I am not known for working to a quilt pattern. So I have opted to design as I go, as per usual. But I do have a basic idea of where I am headed. I am making a turtle quilt inspired by the tribal turtle motif on two of the original fabrics.
Turtle motif on fabric from Vanuatu
I have now designed my turtle appliqué. It is influenced by the turtle above, but also by a beautiful turtle batik I have in my collection. If you like batiks, you might recognise this fabric, its been around for a while.
Turtle batik fabric from Lunn Studios for Artisan Batiks from Robert Kaufman Fabrics
I actually started a quilt for my nephew two years ago inspired by this turtle batik, that I also intended to put a turtle appliqué on. But he got a monkey quilt instead. Long story for another day. But it s nice to be returning to the turtle idea. Perhaps I can knock off this UFO too.
My Turtle Appliqué Quilt Design Concept
Here is my turtle appliqué design:
My turtle appliqué design on a very basic rendition of a black and white background
It is quite likely that the quilt background will be significantly different from my quick diagram. The basic plan for the background of the quilt is to create 8×6″ finished blocks out of the black and white fabrics. Some blocks will be fussy cut 6″ squares. Some blocks will be created from 4″ and 2″ squares, with possibly some half-square triangles and/or pinwheels thrown in. I will decide on their overall layout at the end. Basically, I am going to give the free die that comes with the Accuquilt GO! cutter a whirl.
Then, the intention is to add a 1″ red border, and then an 8″ piano key border in black and white. It will finish at 66″ square and I will bind it in red. Or teal. Subject to mind changes, of course!
Where am I at?
Well, the sharing link for having the fabrics cut opened 10 days ago or so. So, you can tell I am a little behind schedule as usual. But the link is not closed yet, and I have my appliqué printed, traced and cut out, so all is not lost!
Turtle appliqué templatesHere are my turtle appliqué pieces. The teal fabric will be mostly covered by the red, so I bought a cheap Prima solid for this layer.
I actually have no intention of pre-cutting my black and white fabrics. I will do this as I create blocks. Not efficient if I was producing a quilt from a pattern, for sure. But it is the way I design quilts from scratch. So I am claiming that this QAL stage is done to my satisfaction. And I hope you will find my design process more interesting if I actually report it like it is rather than showing you just the end result.
If you would like to see the other projects in this quilt along, the original ideas links are found here. There were 14 projects joined up from the very beginning – there may be some late comers too if you keep an eye on the progress linkys. There is certainly a great variety, you are sure to see something that inspires you!
