There are so many fabulous patterns! Last Spring Ruby Star Society hosted a quilt along for their free pattern, Jelly Rainbow. As soon as I saw it I knew I wanted to make one. Have you ever done that, felt compelled to start a new project immediately? I love starting a new project, pulling fabrics and deciding on backing & binding.
I didn’t have a jelly roll but I did have enough colorful yardage to cut my own 2.5 inch strips. I was so excited that I got started on it right away. I knew that I would want a slightly bigger quilt than the pattern makes, so I made extra blocks. The piecing for this pattern starts out making big strip sets. I really enjoyed seeing the gradient of colors that was forming as I sewed the strips together. I love color! I’m the gal who has never been able to pick a favorite color. Why should I have to choose? The interplay and how each color can look different depending on what colors it’s paired with has always fascinated me.
The strip sets are cut into squares and then cut diagonally, which leaves a bunch of bias edges. While it’s not really difficult, you do want to be careful not to over handle bias edges so that everything stays nice and square. When I read the pattern and saw those bias edges, I starched all my fabric before cutting to help stabilize it.
My blocks came together pretty quickly but I got stuck on the layout. The original pattern has 16 blocks in a 4 x 4 pattern. I made twice that number of blocks so that I could decide just how much bigger and what layout I wanted. This is where I spent a lot of time! With a four by four arrangement the secondary pattern is very clear. When I added extra blocks that changed the look of the quilt. Individually, I loved my blocks but when I laid them out next to one another, I struggled with placement. It took some time just staring at it to make up my mind. In fact I kind of just decided, sew them together, it’s going to be fine. And it was!
The backing and binding are both by Rashida Coleman Hale of Ruby Star Society. I love the colorful bottles with fun names. I cut the black and white stripe on the bias to really set off the whole quilt. I also added a simple 2.5 border around the whole quilt so I wasn’t dealing with bias edges as I quilted it. I think it gives a bit of breathing room to all that color.
Once it was a top I knew that I wanted curves for the quilting. I was considering a spiral starting in the center. I set out to baste it and realized that I didn’t have quite the right size batting. So again, it waited. Then I got my long arm and I was excited to QUILT.ALL.THE.THINGS!!!
I chose this gorgeous digital quilting design called Raindrops on Water by Three Sisters Fabric. I absolutely love the texture this produces! The quilting really makes this one of my favorite finishes ever. I used a 60 wt. white Glide thread and it just melts into all of those colors so nicely.
Do you have a quilt that you were excited to begin but then sat around waiting to be finished? Maybe it still needs quilting? I’d love to help you get that quilt finished! If you’d like me to add this kind of yummy quilting texture to your quilt click the button to get started!