March's Island Batik Ambassador is Ambassador's Choice, named "It's All Up To You." We get free reign to make whatever we want with whichever Island Batik fabrics we want. I decided to take this as motivation to get at least some of this year's teacher quilts done with a few months to spare. First up is for Mr. B, who says his favorite color is sky blue.
The products featured in this post were given to me by Island Batik, Accuquilt, Schmetz, and Aurifil.
To give you some backstory, every year I make quilts for Fire Monkey's teachers. As soon as a new school year starts, Fire Monkey is tasked with finding out his teacher's favorite colors. This year, I'm making four quilts: his two classroom teachers (dual language school, so one English and one Spanish teacher) and the two before-school teachers, both who have been there since he was in Kindergarten. For Mr. B's quilt, I went through all my blue Island Batik scraps and pulled everything on the lighter end of the spectrum. There are fabrics from multiple previous collections in this, and I paired the blue scraps with solid white. This was cut 100% with my Accuquilt. I used the 4" HST die from my 8" cube.
I made a very similar quilt in July 2020
for the Island Batik/Accuquilt Christmas in July challenge. I used the
same layout. The July 2020 version was made with 3" finished HSTs,
instead of the 4" HST of this version, but that's really the only
difference. I named that one Sunny Skies, so in keeping with the theme,
I'm calling this one Blue Skies.
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| Sunny Skies, from July 2020 |
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| Blue Skies, March 2023 |
This has been my leader and ender project for a while, and I'm so glad to see it come together! I used Hobbs bleached 80/20 batting, perfect for quilts with a white background. I used Schemtz needles for all piecing and quilting, as they are the only needles I will use. I chose to quilt in kind of a trip around the world formation, and I did lines on each end that echoed around the square. I used Aurifil 2770Very Light Delft in the blue sections and 2000 Light Sand in the white sections.
So that's one down, three to go! I don't think I get can all four done this month, but I am hoping to finish at least two others while the challenges are "all up to me!"
Lovely! I love the shades of blues, and the size of the block makes it go faster. It's great that you've planned ahead to do these as leader/ender, too. I need to get a little more organized so I can do that, too. Actually, I have projects that should be used that way, if I find them, lol Gorgeous!
ReplyDeleteFabulous quilt and how great to have one of the teacher quilts already done. You are a super mom!
ReplyDeleteGood job on a pretty blue one, how nice it will be to have quilt gifts done early!
ReplyDeleteSo pretty, Emily! You know, I didn't use to like blue in quilting so much, but now I LOVE it!! I know Mr. B will appreciate this thoughtful gift, as will Fire Monkey's other teachers!
ReplyDeleteThis is beautiful, Emily! I know he will love it. No blue skies here today except for your quilt. Have a nice weekend.
ReplyDeleteLovely quilt and a lovely story to go with it. Fire Monkey seems to enjoy his participation in the process. As a teacher I would have loved this.
ReplyDeleteSo soft and lovely.
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