“Seasons of Play” Quilt

This week the second Project QUILTING Challenge of Season 7 was posted.  My mother-in-law, Diane Lapacek comes up with all the challenge themes and this week she chose to inspire us with “Seasons.”  I have to admit – I wasn’t too excited about “seasons” except for one thing … it fit another challenge I had.  Every year I buy into the Sun Prairie Heritage Quilt Show Quilt Challenge which comes with a fat quarter of fabric and some sort of challenge theme.  This year the theme was “April Showers” and it had a brightly colored umbrella fabric print fabric.  April Shower’s and Seasons can completely mix with each other – it was time to start the challenge.

I’m trying to think of the way this whole idea began but I’m not sure where the seed initially was planted.  The first thing I did though was choose eight fabrics … a sky and a ground for each season.  I then created a template in EQ7 for for a 10” drunkard’s path block to print out.  I used this as the base of my creation.  I knew I wanted spring and summer on the bottom because it just worked so well with the fabrics I had chosen for the season so that’s how the orientation was determined.  At this point, I was trying to figure out a way to add something fun and whimsical to the quilt.  Initially I was going to draw a duck in boots holding an umbrella for spring.  Then perhaps a duck lounging under an umbrella in summer and so forth.  My duck drawing were just not up to par though so I started to think of a different solution.  So … I went to my stash.  I found the perfect fabric that had the perfect scale people that I needed for the quilt.  It was the Sarah Jane parade fabric from Michael Miller.  I fused heat n bond lite to the back of each of the kids that I wanted to put on my quilt.  I then cut really carefully along the lines and fused them in the appropriate season.  I then realized I needed a little more … so I added a tree. 

For spring … I added boots to the little girl using the challenge fabric for the “Spring Shower’s” challenge.  I also replaced the flag she was holding with an umbrella again with the challenge fabric.  On the tree I added flowers to indicate spring blossoms and of course a rainy background fabric.

Summer … I fused the boy riding the bike.  I didn’t add anything to him … he was already perfect.  I did add some bright green leaves to the tree branches though.

Fall – a little girl excited to be playing in the leaves!  All the leaves are fused on and cut from the challenge fabric.

Winter … I had to do a bit to winter.  The little girl from the fabric was wearing a short sleeved dress and no pants – definitely not warm enough for winter.  So … I made her a coat, snow pants, boots, and a hat … all from the challenge fabric.  I also added a fun little sparkly snowman to the mix.  His hat and scarf are made from the challenge fabric.

I made one of my “signature” flanges using the challenge fabric.  I used a wide range of aurifil threads for the free-motion quilting portion of the quilt.  It was a lot of fun figuring out different patterns and designs for each season. 

And with that .. “Seasons of Play” was complete.  

On the back of the quilt I used the extra parade fabric that I had fussy cut from for the front. I  think it’s a fun way to see where the people started and what I turned them into.  It’s also really easy to see all my free motion quilting on the back … which I must admit … I’m pretty darn proud of. Final size: 23” x 23” Designed, pieced and quilted by Kim Lapacek, Poynette, WI