Beothuk Star Quilt Along

Mark your calendars for the commencement of the third annual QAL here at mmm! quilts. Once again, you will be making one of my own original designs. This year's quilt is not a shadow quilt; however, it does have a wee surprise, which, if you know me at all, is something I love to incorporate in my quilt designs.

This is the graphic for this year's QAL. Feel free to grab it and put it on your sidebar. I'll be starting a hashtag for Instagram too: #beothukstarqal
This year's quilt is 42.5" square. What does the quilt look like? Read on to find out!

A Plug for Kits

Travel usually means a probable lack of sewing. It can add stress to an already stressful packing time when one can't forecast exactly what one feels like sewing, or forecast all the tools to take to complete the job.  Enter kits. I'm a cautious proponent of them; I have to really really like a quilt to buy the kit. On this recent jet down to Florida for a few days, a kit gave me some much-needed fabric therapy. Florida gave me some colour-therapy too. What a combo.

So. I have three nephews and one niece. Two of the nephews have their quilts, Shift for Callum, and Radiance for Aidan. Next in line is my niece, Fawn. I picked up a couple of pieces of fabric two years ago on sale with her in mind; I had no pattern as yet. Then, last year I saw one of Connecting Threads' kits (affiliate link) using Amanda Jean Nyberg's line, Good Neighbors, and it was so bright and cheery I immediately knew it would be perfect for this bright and bubbly niece of mine. The price was excellent too, as are all of their prices.

Oh Florida with your bright light and wonderful colours; there's just something about pink and orange...

I've already made two quilts using this fabric line. Cutting it, sewing with it, and then quilting the top makes my heart sing; the fabrics are colourful and whimsical. So, when I knew I wouldn't be sewing, because I wasn't taking a machine with me, I thought aha! I can take the kit and get all the pieces cut! I was only going with a small carry-on bag, so I took a quick look at the pieces I needed to cut and whacked off an appropriately sized piece from each fat quarter in the kit. This kit was very generous; I will have enough to make a second top from the other half of the fat quarters, just need to add in 1.5 yards of a background fabric.

Here and there over the course of the 5 days, I fondled and cut the fabric--did you see the latest 'Midnight Quilt Show'? Angela's warning about some material not being suitable for non-quilters?! She cracks me up. Well it wasn't too long before I had those lovely neat stacks of happy fabric you see in the photos above. Here's a close-up of one of the beautiful hibiscus flowers behind the fabric:

MacGyver's variegated ginger plants he put in last year are thriving!

I spent all that time stacking them so neatly, and then I thought, hmm, maybe should spread them out a little, let you see them!

I found it rather à propos cutting these in sunny colourful Florida. My tree frogs were nestled on our front door once more, such a sweet welcoming committee they make. They're so adorable, smiling sleepily.

Both were snuggled on the window arch for the first few days, but today one was perched at the bottom just behind the wreath, aww.

So consider a kit next time you want to have something on hand that, ha, kind of like fast food (healthy stuff, like Subway of course), provides a mindless, ready-to-go project that will still itch that makers-gotta-make itch we all have, even when on vacation. Now, when we come back after Christmas, to stay for a little longer than a few days, and I have my sewing machine in tow, I'll be able to park my butt in my sewing chair, plug in the machine and let 'er rip sewing the squares and rectangles back together to make this sweet quilt! I'm sure you know, but Connecting Threads has lots of kits on sale right now, lots of great sales, period.

Linking up
Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Crazy Mom Quilts
Busy Hands Quilts