Fielke flowers

'Fanciful Flowers' baby quilt
completed December 2012

My quilt friends have been raving for years about the Material Obsession books, specifically the work of co-author Sarah Fielke.

Sarah showing off samples from "Quilting From Little Things"
via Fat Quarterly

Laurie loved Sarah's Dotty for Dresden quilt so much, she made a beautifully faithful version that fills my heart with joy.  And red is my least-favorite color!   I mean, seriously:

Laurie's beautiful "Dotty for Dresden"
via Dresden Lane

And my friend Lia made this amazing eagle quilt, modeled on another Material Obsession quilt. Here it is on display at our Lowell Quilt Festival show this past August:

Lia's eagles

We were at Quilt Market last year, when Sarah had just released Quilting From Little Things, and were able to stand in line for autographed copies.  I didn't know her, but was just happy to get a nice book.

via Sarah Fielke

Cut to the next day, when I read the whole thing cover to cover on the plane home, and fell in quilt love.   (No joke:  some random middle aged dude leaned across the aisle mid-flight, gestured to the book, and said:  "Those blankets are really nice looking!")

Sarah Fielke quilt via blickfangquilts and knits

I have since plowed through all her other books, and am now moderately obsessed with Sarah's exuberant, more-is-more use of pattern.  She has a way of mixing a million discordant prints, and still winding up with a harmonious and calm finished product.

'Fanciful Flowers' quilt, from Material Obsession

When one of my work friends announced his wife's pregnancy,  I took this as an invitation to go Full Fielke.  I was quickly up to my elbows in my stash and scrap bin,  pulling hoarded pink Amy Butler prints, repro fat quarters, and every Flea Market fancy scrap I could lay hands on.

The baby quilt I made is based on the Fanciful Flowers quilt, from Material Obsession.

I only made a few changes from the pattern in the book.   I changed the layout from a 3x4 arrangement to a 3x3 arrangement, and left the seed pods off the blooms.

My corner repeats were done in soft greens instead of oranges.

I'd originally purchased a cream-on-pink dot to back the floral applique blocks, but didn't have enough to support the 18" x 18" scale of the blocks.  I grabbed a very pale peach Lizzy House pearl bracelet print at our Gather Here sew-in, and turned out to be even happier with it than the original selection.

The quilt was backed with another Amy Butler that I've always loved.  I quilted this on the long arm at my friend's Linda's house, using a big loopy daisy concept.   Linda lent her steady arms to helping me highlight the shape of flower buds, so they'd show on the back.

I LOVED making this and was really sad to see it go.  This is the first gift quilt I've ever really considered re-making, so that I can have one of my own.   Don't be surprised if you see this again.  Even if I don't re-make this one,  I suspect this is not the last of my Fielke quilts...