A MINI ADVENTURE

When I Met Tula! 

I don't think I ever told you about the time I met Tula Pink - major fan girl moment, I was really impressed with myself that I actually managed to get whole sentences out and they even made some sense!

There's always that worry that if you meet an idol or someone you greatly admire, they may not quite live up to expectations etc, but she really did! Tula was so kind and down to earth, she walked around the room before hand, talking to everyone, having a little sit down looking at the projects people had brought along, giving advice and just generally being lovely.

She then went on to give a brilliant lecture on how she started out in this business, what inspires her, her design process and thought process - the whole thing was wonderfully inspiring and a very insightful look at the fabric designing and manufacturing industry.

A couple of people asked questions about a fabrics 'life cycle', why certain fabrics are only made in seemingly small quantities and never reprinted, the responses I found quite fascinating as I've not got a great deal of experience in the manufacturing side of things. It certainly went a long way to explaining why the resale of some of her earlier lines is down right extortionate in some cases - I will add that this is through private sales and not something she can control.

What is the point of all this you are probably wondering? Not much, I simply adore Tula Pink and wanted to share my love of her fabric and creativity before I go on to show you a mini quilt I made for a Tula Swap. I found it rather difficult to cut into my Tula stash, especially knowing it was going to two other homes and not staying with me, but I got there in the end.

The only real request made from my swap partner was for the purple butterfly from the Eden collection to feature somewhere in the mini quilt, so with that as my starting point I set out a Tula colour wheel to see what jumped out at me. I knew I wanted a mix of prints and solids, but had no design in mind and opted for a more experimental approach of building the quilt as I went.

I had settled on some kind of New York Beauty and Flying Geese combo because I just love them and the endless possibilities there are when using the fabulous book, but that was it I didn't follow a specific pattern so they were both totally unique.

I played around with each section as I had only pinned them in place on my design wall - I often do this if I'm experimenting with a quilt design or playing with my own take on an existing pattern, rather than sewing it up and having to unpick it. When I am happy with a section and I know I won't be changing it then I go ahead and stitch it in place. 

I didn't want two totally identical mini quilts, so for the second I added in some fussy cut pattern matching. It was the first time I had tried it with facial features, it's not perfect if you look very closely but I'm happy with it for a first attempt and I can report that my partner who ended up with this one loved it.

There were so many patterns and varying prints to choose from that it did take a while for me to actually set this one in its final background, where I had used solids for most of the outer rings I wanted a striking print, eventually it was the lovely Deity elephant from Eden in Orchid that won. 

I really enjoy making mini quilts and have been in several mini swaps over the years, there is something quite satisfying about being able to make a quilt from start to finish is a day or a weekend depending on design, even if it is a mini one!

Happy Quilting

Kerry xx