In 2015 I was the president of my local Modern Quilt Guild, South Sound MQG. One of my outgoing acts as President involved working with the outgoing Vice President to come up with a challenge for our yearly quilt show that takes place during Spring Arts Walk in Olympia, WA. The fabrics we selected were from V & Co Color Theory. I got the Navy Poppies colorway.
This color way is right up my alley, I pretty much love all things blue. The other part of the challenge, because picking out one fabric wasn’t enough for us, was that the quilt needed to be an improv quilt. Meaning that there should be no real pattern used, make it up yourself.
As I was pulling fabrics for the challenge I got in my mind this image of my daughter, Anne, standing at our upstairs window looking at the sunrise before school this winter. The sky turns these brilliant shades of blues, pinks and yellows and it always makes her so happy, mostly because when we see these colors it means it isn’t raining and in the winter in Washington we always enjoy a rare break in the rain!
I decided to make a sunrise quilt for Anne. I pieced together different width blues and grays for the sky and then I sliced the piece apart with slight improv curves and inserted curvy rays to make a sunrise.
I had so much fun quilting this quilt on my new long arm! In the background I used Magnifico by Superior Threads and quilted flames, and in the rays themselves, I quilted pebbles with a yellow thread by Signature. I absolutely loved quilting this one, it is a custom design and while there is at least one pucker, which is mostly due to the nature of improv quilting and I’m still learning, I am 100% happy with how the quilt turned out, and more importantly, so is Anne!
So yet another finish f0r 2016! If you live in the Olympia/South Sound area, South Sound Modern Quilt Guild will be exhibiting at Canvas Works in downtown as part of Arts Walk on April 22nd and 23rd. Stop by and see all of the incredible improv quilts that were created by the talented members of the guild!
