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Turn Over A New Leaf

With weather like this it is impossible to not be inspired by all the colors of the blooms. I wanted to really show this in one of my projects, so I looked up this free tutorial by Ivory Spring. She walks us through quilting a wonderful leaf/petal pattern. After reading this you can go straight to you quilting room and try it out! See more from Ivory Spring at https://ivoryspring.wordpress.com/

Thread Talk from my Sewing

I caved… I gave in and succumbed to your request to see the schematic of that leaf/petal quilting motif combo! THANKS EVERYONE, for all your kind words on that motif. I won’t be able to respond to you personally due to the time crunch I am in right at this moment. I hope you understand – please know that I truly truly appreciate hearing from you.

It all started with the leaves on one of the fabrics I used for my “Charmed” quilt. See how cute those leaves are? [ This is another example of using fabrics at as starting point for quilting motifs. Click here to read more.]

I adapted the center using a swirl because I thought I would just start out with something familiar to me — I only have about 6 hours to quilt the entire quilt. So here is my stitching sequence. I started out with a swirl, up and down to the starting point.

And then, I stitched out a leaf outline around the swirl.

Then I scalloped around the leaf outline.

Here you see the same motif with the leaf outline started from the other side of the swirl bottom.

Then, it’s a matter of filling in with random swirls and vines and what-nots until you feel like swirling with another leaf/petal motif again! The wonderful, wonderful thing about this motif is that it doesn’t require exact precision on the stitching path. The general look is a lighthearted one so that you can have one scallop a little wonky, and one scallop a little crooked, and the motif will still come out as charming as can be! VERY very forgiving!

So I had a few minutes before church to actually sit down and doodle a bit, and I was able to come up with a quilting motif that looks more like the original leaf on the fabric. This time you would start with the leaf vein before the swirl in the center, and and then just follow the same sequence to complete the motif.

I hope this post gives you more ideas on what to quilt on your precious quilt tops. Meanwhile, I will work on more adaptations of this leaf/petal motif. I will let you know if I come up with more ideas.

So I caved, I gave in, I succumbed…. I hope I have delivered as well.