I found this quilt pattern on Quilters Digest on Pinterest and I knew I wanted to try it.

After I saw the quilt, I just happened to come across one of Tula Pink’s videos where she talked about using the flowing color palette. She, of course, had the correct word for it, but as it happens almost once a day now, I can’t think of a word. It will come to me eventually. I’m chalking this problem up to the heart rhythm medication I’m taking. At least I hope that’s what it is. I guess I won’t know until after the doctor takes me off the medication which might be another year. (If my AFib stays in check, maybe at the one year mark from my ablation).

**Update** I knew I’d remember the word sooner or later! The word I wanted when I wrote “flowing color palette” was OMBRE, which means “the blending of one color hue to another, usually moving tints and shades from light to dark”. (But in order to finally come up with it, I had to watch several of Tula Pink‘s videos on Instagram.)

Yellow is a color that I don’t use very often but when I put this little quilt together, I knew that I wanted the border in yellow. I’m not sorry I did.

I’ve been practicing my free motion quilting and has been said, the more you do it, the better you will become. Another very helpful idea I found was to trace the design on tracing paper and actually sew on top of the tracing paper. I found that you have to make sure to use very light lines (I use a pencil) to avoid the pencil design ending up sewn into your fabric. It does take a little time to pick out all the little pieces of paper, but I think it makes a much prettier, neater design than trying to freehand the entire design. Another thing I’ve found it that unless I use the same color thread on the bottom and top of the quilt, the bottom thread seems to show through. I’m sure there’s a fix to this, but I haven’t come across it yet. I’ve tried adjusting my bobbin tension and it does help some, but not enough. If you know the answer to this, please let me know!

I decided to do a Criss-cross design on all the hearts. I think it gave a nice contrast to the center flourishes. The border was quilted in a half-heart type pattern.

I machine bind the top but hand stitch the back. I think this looks much neater, and, I’ve almost got the corners down pat.