de Jong Dream House: October 2016

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Quilt #68: Orla Take 2

One of my all-time favorite quilts is quilt #51, a baby quilt I made for a friend, inspired by her amazing Orla Kiely stems wallpaper.

There's not much better for a quilter than to know that something you made brings joy to the recipient. Not only did Aletha love her surprise, but she has been posting adorable photos of her little guy on his quilt.

I probably could have sold this quilt a few times over based on the comments on her photos, but I've decided that making quilts on commission is just not for me.

However, that didn't stop me from agreeing to make another version of the quilt in the other color scheme for Aletha's sister, who also has Orla Kiely stem wallpaper.

Photo Credit: Aletha VanderMaas

I'm very glad I took good notes when I made the first quilt because it made this one so much easier. I even still had the Silhouette file for the leaves. The hardest part by far was finding the right prints. The mustardy yellows and yellow-browns are not the easiest colors to match these days. It's a good thing I love fabric shopping because I only found 3 prints in my stash. I found the other eight in six different quilt shops!

I've gotten much better at using my Silhouette Cameo so I was able to cut all 96 leaves in about 30 minutes!

Something new I figured out with this quilt is how to finally avoid sewing wrong sides together when working with white tonals. I'm going to blame this one my brain injury!

The other thing I did with this quilt that I've never done before is make a fabric cheat sheet. The browns are easy to get mixed up, so I numbered everything and attached a small square of each print at the bottom of the paper so make extra sure I used the right leaves at the right time.

Because I had my notes from the first quilt, placement went by quilting. I used my two 6.5"x 24" rulers so I could place multiple rows at the same time.

Even with all my double checking, I still managed to make a few mistakes, but they were caught before I did the applique.

It didn't take as long to applique the leaves this time. My muscle memory is improving!

Once again I used Sulky invisible thread to quilt straight vertical lines 1.5" apart.

I used the same font and design for the label. I've started to add my website to my labels so recipients can learn more about how their quilt was made. I'm hoping that when Victoria gets this quilt, either she or her sister will take a picture of it in front of her awesome wallpaper!

Speaking of how quilts are made...I'm on Instagram! I've been playing around with it for the last couple of quilts, and now I'm ready to tell the world! To see more pictures of this quilt in progress, look for #orlatake2. If you'd like to see what I'm currently working on, follow me at de Jong Dream House.

Update: My friend has delivered the quilt and sent me this awesome picture!