We often express our hopes and wishes to other people in the form of flowers - either as a bunch of flowers or as a symbolic bunch of flowers on a card - so this became my plan. I wanted to make a really jolly, happy and exuberant quilt as my quilts are usually more restrained, and maybe subconsciously I was wishing for a bit of colour at the end of a long grey January!
I was going to add a little banner at the top of the quilt, saying "Be Happy", but when I tried it out I didn't like it and although it would have made the quilt more obviously relevant to the theme artistic vanity won over.
The vase and table cloth are pieced, and the flowers are raw-edge applique, with quilting to make parts of the flowers stand out. I thought a couple of the flowers needed a bit of extra pop so added buttons to the centres - the largest amount of time was spent in fussing with the composition. Finally I bound the quilt round a canvas and stapled it in place. I had a lot of fun making it!
I love this quilt. It really is full of colour and exuberance. Your wish for colour at this grey time of year has certainly come true and it makes me me smile to see all those colourful flowers so your wish for others to be happy has worked as well! I'm glad you didn't put a banner. I think it is perfect just as it is :)
ReplyDeleteThanks Janine, I did worry that the quilt was a bit tangential to the theme but sometimes things go off in a particular direction by themselves :-)
DeleteLove the flowers especially this time of year.
ReplyDeleteYes, we could all use some cheering up in January! :-)
DeleteWhat a great riff on this theme! Your quilt is so pretty and cheerful. I agree with Janine - it's perfect!
ReplyDeleteThank you Wendy :-)
DeleteThis quilt is just eye catching and full of fun from the color to the type of flowers to the polka dots. Fussing with the composition always takes me the most amount of time, too. I swear I have a few more grey hairs after every Reveal! Ha! What a neat idea to stretch it as a canvas. (I put mine up on the walls with straight pins.) Thanks for taking on us on a winter vacation to Mexico! Did I mention orange is my favorite color?
ReplyDeleteThanks Maureen! We've just dyed our ageing sofa cover rusty orange, and I'm discovering a love of brightness! My usual palette is fairly subdued but I really admire colour in other people's work.
DeleteWhat a gloriously happy quilt Catherine, I think you made the right decision with the banner, I defy anyone looking at this quilt not to feel uplifted :)
ReplyDeleteThanks Fiona, it was fun to do something so bright!
DeleteI really like this quilt very much :-)
ReplyDeletexx
Thank you very much Radka! It was fun to make :-)
DeleteSo bright and cheerful! And I love the little mini-slideshow of its creation.
ReplyDeleteThank you! :-)
DeleteI like your thought process before and during it’s creation. And you looked at the theme with a different perception. This WAS a difficult theme. You really brought it home by depicting what one might do to send best wishes. I like that you didn’t add words to it. It lets the viewer think about what they feel looking at it.
ReplyDeleteXx, Carol
Thank you! Yes, that's a good point about the words :-)
DeleteThat's put a smile on my face and definitely brightened up a grey February. I love the timelapse series of photos too.
ReplyDeleteThank you Ruth - the timelapse only shows a small part of my dithering :-)
DeleteSuch a beautiful and happy quilt Catherine. It brings me so much joy looking at it. I love that you stretched it like a canvas. I think really makes every detail pop even more.
ReplyDeleteThank you Martha - it was a new thing to try and I will definitely be doing it again!
Delete