Everyday Quilt Inspiration: Turtle Fabrics

31 Days of Finding Quilt Inspiration in Real Life

About a month ago I signed up for the Splash of Color quilt along from Busy Hands Quilts. The rules mostly consist of a few deadlines for the quilt stages, and that the colours of the quilt are to be predominately black and white with colour highlights. Apart from that, the direction the quilt takes is up to each quilter.

Splash Quilt Along @ Busy Hands Quilts

So, I decided to do a quilt with some fabrics my husband bought me in Vanuatu some time back. Two of them are black and white, the other is red. Here are my original fabrics and the post I wrote about my idea for a black, white and red turtle quilt.

black and white and red fabrics from Vanuatu
The fabrics for my Splash of Color quilt inspiration.
Vanuatu décor color scheme from Clever Chameleon
The colours in our Vanuatu bedroom.

Since that post, we have been back to Vanuatu to continue Paul’s humanitarian telecommunications research. While we were there I acquired more fabrics specifically for this project :). And some more inspiration. I decided to add a little greyed blue or teal to my splash of colour, thanks to the Vanuatu décor in our bedroom.

Here is my final pile of goodies to work from:

Vanuatu fabrics
The white, grey and teal fabrics are from my stash here at home. The red and black fabrics are all from Vanuatu.

Finding Quilt Inspiration in the Everyday: Day 25

The next challenge in the Splash of Color quilt along was to choose a quilt pattern. Well, I am not known for working to a quilt pattern. So I have opted to design as I go, as per usual. But I do have a basic idea of where I am headed. I am making a turtle quilt inspired by the tribal turtle motif on two of the original fabrics.

Turtle motif on fabric from Vanuatu
Turtle motif on fabric from Vanuatu

I have now designed my turtle appliqué. It is influenced by the turtle above, but also by a beautiful turtle batik I have in my collection. If you like batiks, you might recognise this fabric, its been around for a while.

Turtle batik fabric
Turtle batik fabric from  Lunn Studios for Artisan Batiks from Robert Kaufman Fabrics

I actually started a quilt for my nephew two years ago inspired by this turtle batik, that I also intended to put a turtle appliqué on. But he got a monkey quilt instead. Long story for another day. But it s nice to be returning to the turtle idea. Perhaps I can knock off this UFO too.

My Turtle Appliqué Quilt Design Concept

Here is my turtle appliqué design:

Turtle appliqué quilt design
My turtle appliqué design on a very basic rendition of a black and white background

It is quite likely that the quilt background will be significantly different from my quick diagram. The basic plan for the background of the quilt is to create 8×6″ finished blocks out of the black and white fabrics. Some blocks will be fussy cut 6″ squares. Some blocks will be created from 4″ and 2″ squares, with possibly some half-square triangles and/or pinwheels thrown in. I will decide on their overall layout at the end. Basically, I am going to give the free die that comes with the Accuquilt GO! cutter a whirl.

Accuquilt GO! die

Then, the intention is to add a 1″ red border, and then an 8″ piano key border in black and white. It will finish at 66″ square and I will bind it in red. Or teal. Subject to mind changes, of course!

Where am I at?

Well, the sharing link for having the fabrics cut opened 10 days ago or so. So, you can tell I am a little behind schedule as usual. But the link is not closed yet, and I have my appliqué printed, traced and cut out, so all is not lost!

Turtle appliqué design
Turtle appliqué templates
Turtle appliqué cut out
Here are my turtle appliqué pieces. The teal fabric will be mostly covered by the red, so I bought a cheap Prima solid for this layer.

I actually have no intention of pre-cutting my black and white fabrics. I will do this as I create blocks. Not efficient if I was producing a quilt from a pattern, for sure. But it is the way I design quilts from scratch. So I am claiming that this QAL stage is done to my satisfaction. And I hope you will find my design process more interesting if I actually report it like it is rather than showing you just the end result.

Red Clever Chameleon logo

Linking this post up with the Splash of Color QAL on the cutting fabric page.

If you would like to see the other projects in this quilt along, the original ideas links are found here. There were 14 projects joined up from the very beginning – there may be some late comers too if you keep an eye on the progress linkys. There is certainly a great variety, you are sure to see something that inspires you!

See you again tomorrow!

Linking up to:
Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss, Freemotion by the River, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Crazy Mom Quilts

11 Replies to “Everyday Quilt Inspiration: Turtle Fabrics”

    1. Happy so far! Fingers crossed it all works out. Nothing like a quilt design fail in public! hahahaha 🙂

  1. Lovely fabric choices! Your quick sketch looks perfect. This will be so happy! Thanks for sharing this on Wednesday Wait Loss.

  2. It looks great! I am sure it is going to turn out beautifully… looking forward to seeing the next steps! xx

  3. WOW! Ambitious undertaking. Maybe not for you, but for me it looks daunting and marvelous at the same time. I am excited to follow along as you go.

    1. That’s really kind of you to say so. Thanks for visiting my blog and making my day. 🙂

    1. Thanks Connie. I am looking forward to getting this one done and on my couch! 🙂

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