Quilting inspiration

Get the rundown on how Linda, from Craft Apple in Texas, created this beautiful quilt.

Even though school has started it still feels very much like summer around here in Texas. We’re still wearing shorts, tank tops, applying sunscreen, and staying inside during 100+ degree F (37+ degree C) temps.

Summers around here mean our fruit basket is always full of nice, ripe nectarines or plums. Our fridge is stocked with berries and there is usually a melon or papaya on the counter. Lots of fruit means large bowls of fruit salad at dinner. I always like a nice sweet melon to be the foundation of my fruit salad, then toss in berries to give it colour. The kids often request banana slices, and peaches are a nice touch as well.

I was working on a quilt this summer that reminded me of our fruit salad. The way I like to build a fruit salad is similar to the way I like to build a quilt. I like using linen to tie everything together and use prints to give a splash of colour. The linen is my melon and the prints are my berries.

This quilt turned out a lot larger than I expected, about 4 ft square (120cm square). It was intended to be a baby spit-up quilt but I’m sure it can be used as a blanket when baby is well into the toddler years. This quilt design is called “Chimney Sweep”. This is the second one I’ve made and I’m not tired of it yet.

All fabrics were from my stash. When I make a quilt like this I like to go through and pull fabrics from my stash that coordinate. In this case it was pinks and reds, one print for each of the “chimney tops”. I try to put my favourite print in the middle and put coordinating prints next to each other. Sometimes prints don’t seem to match, but the quilting lines really pull everything together. Most of the prints were cotton, but there is one voile print and one little girl’s dress that I cut apart.