This month the Island Batik Ambassadors have partnered with AccuQuilt to use the Tree of Life die in any way we chose. They encouraged us to be creative.
Looking at my quilt you are probably wondering where the tree is. And you're right. I definitely didn't use it in the traditional way. If you look at the image of the finished block below do you see those odd shaped white pieces to the left and right of the trunk of the tree? Those were the pieces that intrigued me because they were different. Not square, not triangular.
Okay, so what piece is this? Piece G and shown below. I realized that if I added a few H pieces I could get a nice half square triangle and then make two of those into squares. Hmm....
The next step was to get on my computer and draw this in Electric Quilt to figure out exactly what that looked like.
I considered this design for awhile, but decided against it.
Then I realized I could make a star!
Why gray and red? I'm not sure. I love red and it's sort of Christmasy, but not totally and could be used year around.
I had a lot of fun quilting my project. On those strange G shapes I did a bunch of continuous curve arcs to fill the space.
I also quilted loops on the black in the center because the fabric looks like loops.
Gray Island Batik solid went on the back and it's fun to see how the quilting shows up. This quilt was quilted with Aurifil thread using Hobbs Heirloom wool batting and Schmetz Microtex Needles. I love how the batting gives the feathers around the edge a lot of poof.
Accuquilt requested that we give our quilt to someone who needed some Joy in their life. My friend him has been so helpful with teaching me to garden during the course of the pandemic and I wanted to bring Joy to her! She was thrilled!
I hope you get to quilt today!
Suzy
Be sure to check out all the other Island Batik Ambassador Blogs!
I was thrilled that my New York Beauty I titled Spiraling Around New York took an Honorable Mention Ribbon at the Minnesota Quilter's Show! It features the new Woodblock Bouquet collection from Island Batik.
Here are the gorgeous fabrics in this collection. I'll be the first to admit I am not a big fan of brown. However, I love a warm rich chocolate brown which is heavily featured in this collection and I found them great fun to work with.
My first block complete!
This is the first block's twin sister. I made two of each style,
And I did a whole lot of pinning to make sure the curves worked well. I definitely learned a lot about curves on this project.
I also figured out how to make the inner and outer curves easier. I used and Accuquilt die for Drunkard's Path for the inner curve and the outer curve is from the Accuquilt Pickle Dish die. Then I drafted my block size in Electric Quilt 8 to make these two pieces fit perfectly. What size were they? 9 7/8. A strange size to be sure, but when paper piecing the middle section it really didn't matter and I didn't have to hand cut all the curves.
So nice not having to cut these pieces.
My stack of blocks. I think this arrow one is my favorite.
The biggest stumper on this project for me was the layout. I wanted these blocks I had spent so much time on to SING. I went through many possibilities...
I finally decided I liked these off center spiral designs best.
But of course I was short...and had to make a few more!
Top complete!
I decided this needed to be quilted like a show quilt, so each area is quilted in matching Aurifil thread. I don't have a lot of brown in my thread collection so my mom and I drove around to many quilt stores in the Minneapolis area collecting them. I used my favorite batting for show quilting Hobbs silk batting. It drapes so nicely. My Schmetz Microtex Needles also were great at going through some of the really densely layered intersections.
I decided to add a piping to separate the quilt from the binding. I also used a fat half inch binding to get a picture frame effect.
Blocking the quilt to lay flat is always a scary proposition as you have to get it wet! I didn't prewash these fabrics. However, when washing the whole quilt I use Synthrapol in the washer on hot as well as a few color catchers and the quilt came out perfectly clean. No bleeding!
My quilt hanging at the show. Always so fun to see.
To win one of these FQ Bundles from Island Batik, Click Here
To win my scraps (and there is quite a bit, many fat quarter sized) leave a comment below. I will choose a winner by random draw on July 1.
I hope you get to quilt today! Suzy
Be sure to see what my fellow Ambassadors have created:
I remember my mom telling me a story about my very first quilt. I got to pick out blocks to make and then she was going to help me. She let me pick triangles. Which she herself had never done at that point. I have always like them ever since.
However, I will admit that cutting them with my AccuQuilt GO Big! has made me use them a whole lot more. I love that the dog ears are cut off for you!
A while ago I decided I wanted to make a scrappy quilt using triangles using all my gorgeous Island Batik scraps. I have always loved the traditional ocean waves pattern, but after a disastrous attempt early on in my quilting journey I have never gone back to it until now. The GO cutter just makes it so much easier. I of course had to put my own spin on it and adding sashing and corner stones to make construction easier (for once I actually thought about this ahead of time instead of at the end when I'm trying to put blocks together).
I started off with many many triangles. I always pin them so my ends don't separate while they're under the machine. The pin also works as a nice rudder so I can make sure the needle hits the end exactly where I want it to with my favorite Schmetz Microtex needles and Aurifil thread of course.
Lots of pairs of tiny 1" finished triangles. I know I'm crazy, but I didn't waste any fabric!
I pressed these tiny seams open so they would have less bulk in the finished block.
Laying out the first block!
Trying out some arrangements with the blocks. I couldn't resist and it kept me going. Who thought making 72 of these was a good idea? Oh, right. That was me...because I love to make things harder for myself of course.
Getting closer!
I wanted to get this huge 80 x 88 quilt done quick so I did round of feathers and some continuous curve. I love the way it turned out. I used my favorite Hobbs 80/20 Cotton Poly Blend batting. It's just the best and is perfect for summer quilts here in Minnesota which is what I wanted for this quilt.
This month the Island Batik Ambassadors were challenged to make a Funky Friends Factory creature! I chose Hannah Hedgehog because my son has a love of hedgehogs and a birthday soon.
Hannah has been up to some shenanigans around the house. First she got out because she wanted to smell the spring crocuses.
Then she decided to try to become friends with the peeps. Or was she trying to eat them???
Finally she decided to sit on my quilt because she was curious about it. Hannah has had some adventures!
I chose the fabric for her upper body because I thought it looked spiky like hedgehogs. Then I couldn't resist the orange ears and legs. I didn't have stuffed animal eyes so I found a teal button and a black bead to use instead. She was sewn with Schmetz Needles and Aurifil thread and they worked quite well with no rips as I was stuffing her.
My son loves Hannah and says she was his favorite birthday present!
I was so excited to receive the teal 2020 Aurifil Italian Color Builder of Capri, Italy. These threads are 50 weight cotton and so beautiful. I immediately hopped on Google and started looking at pictures of Capri. What really hit me were the gorgeous teal waters and I knew I wanted to incorporate that into my project somehow.
I started by pulling teal Island Batik fabrics from my stash. I also selected a peach fabric for the background sky with the idea of creating a sunset.
I then started playing with wave formations. I must have drawn 5-10 different drawings which I was unhappy with. Finally I decided to simply cut out wave shapes and start layering them.
Final placement of the waves. Time to fuse!
Since this is an Aurifil challenge I knew I wanted to do a lot of dense quilting. I picked a different filler pattern for each of the wave fabrics. I then did some fill quilting in yellow to give the sun a dense yellow color. Finally I did bands of elongated bars in three different orange and corals to simulate the sunset. I purposely left a small band between them for added contrast. I used one layer of Hobbs 80/20 Cotton/Poly batting inside my quilt. I used my favorite Schmetz Microtex Size 80 needles and it went through the layers of fusible quite easily.
I decided to topstitch down the binding in all three teal threads. However, after breaking a needle on the second outline I decided that two was enough.
I'm really happy with the way the quilt turned out!
