In Full Bloom Mini Quilt Pattern

I'm excited to share a new mini quilt pattern with you today for TGIFF! This one was brewing for a long time before all the various elements came together and I really love how it turned out. Meet In Full Bloom!

Ever since I made my Grateful table runner, I've been wanting to design another texty pattern with the words coloured with crayon but I couldn't come up with the phrase I wanted to use. I've also been admiring the various home décor things I've seen with circles or partial circles with flowers and/or leaves along part of the circle. I wanted to translate that style into a quilt, but couldn't get beyond the basic concept.

Then last September we were in St. John's to move Zach back into his dorm for another year of university and the Airbnb we stayed in had a mug with the phrase 'Live life in full bloom' on it. I can't remember anything about what the mug looked like - what the font was, what colour the words were, even if there were flowers on it (though I assume there must have been) - I just remember reading the phrase and thinking, "That would be perfect inside a circle on a quilt!"

I design my quilts in EQ8, but the options for text in the program are really limited. I started playing in Canva instead, where there are a lot more font options and it's so much easier to manipulate the blocks of text. It took a while to settle on the combination of fonts, colours, and the angle of the words, but eventually the wordy part of the design was exactly what I wanted. I created the partial circle as part of the Canva block, too, then I could import that whole piece into EQ8 to add the flower appliqués. 

Actually making the mini quilt involved playing with different techniques. First, I coloured the words with crayons. I have a tutorial for doing that here, on another wordy mini quilt.

I love how colouring the fabric brings out the texture of the threads woven together to make it.

After colouring the letters, I used Aurifil 12 wt thread to embroider their outlines with a simple backstitch. I love how it gives extra definition to the letters. It also gives a little texture to the quilt. A simple tip to make your backstitched lines look neat - make the stitches shorter. Longer stitches tend to look more jagged or uneven, while short stitches make a smooth line.

Fusible appliqué flowers were next. As always, I had fun digging through my stash to find just the right fabrics for each flower.

At this point, Paul saw the quilt top on my design wall and suggested we hang it in our entryway when it was finished. We've struggled to find just the right thing for one small wall in the entryway, and he thought In Full Bloom would be perfect. There's something about having someone else look at what I've made and like it enough to want it displayed that just feels amazing. 

Once the flowers were fused to the background, I embroidered the partial circle with a chain stitch. I did that after the flowers were on because I didn't want any embroidery under the flowers, so this way I could stitch right up to the edge of them.

For the quilting, I used Aurifil 50 wt thread and started by stitching around each flower and leaf with matching thread.

I used white thread for the rest of the quilting. I outlined the letters. I was quite proud of myself for stitching very close to the edge of each letter and only catching the embroidery once! I outlined the edge of the embroidered circle, too. Then I quilted a dense stipple in the background.

I even went in and stitched the tiny gaps between the flowers (seen here from the back).

As usual, I love how all the quilting looks on the back.

I especially love the way the letters pop!

In Full Bloom will be traveling to Chicago with me on Monday, for the H+H Americas trade show. I'll be doing demos in the Oliso booth Wednesday and Thursday, showing how to colour quilt blocks with crayon and remove the wax, and showing off the wordy possibilities of the technique with both In Full Bloom and Grateful. It's my first time attending an industry trade show and I'm crazy excited (and nervous). I'm hoping to get my patterns in front of lots of quilt shop owners while I'm there!

The In Full Bloom mini quilt pattern is in my shop now, so you can make your own version to adorn whatever wall in your home is needing a bit of inspiration. It would make a great gift, too!

That's my finish for this week. What have you finished recently? Link it up below and be sure to visit some of the other links to celebrate their finishes, too!

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