Aspen Leaves progress

Here is the progress I've made so far on the aspen leaves quilt. The largest leaf is about 27 x 27 on the longest dimensions.

So here is my light box, works great, but only during certain hours of the day. If you'll click on the picture you can see that the paper has three leaves on it. The paper is parchment from a roll I've had a long time. It's great for tracing, but it's going to be gone one day so I want to be careful with it. I used different colored markers to make each leaf, so I wouldn't get confused while I was tracing the pieces onto the freezer paper.


After I traced the whole shape I cut each section so I had a pattern for each color in the leaf. (I finally remembered on the last leaf to make register marks so I could transfer them to the pattern pieces before I cut them apart). I turned the paper on the window wrong side down so the pieces would be the right way when I ironed the freezer paper piece to the fabric.

Once the pattern was ironed onto the fabric, I used a ruler and measured 1/4 inch from the edge of the paper while cutting with a rotary cutter. When I was done with each color I traced around the pattern and made the register marks. I also labeled the pieces with letters to help ease confusion.

  I stuck a pin through each mark and used them to line up the seams, then I pinned a lot more. I figured there weren't that many pieces and the more pins the merrier!

Here you can see the pencil outline. I traced around each freezer paper piece before I removed it.

I played around a lot with MS Paint to see if I could find a background I liked that I wouldn't have to dye. I wasn't having much luck, and then I remembered I bought a bunch of ombre fabric a while ago. I pulled it all out and I think it's going to work. I think I'm going to cut squares, I think so the finished size will be four inches, and sew them together so they kind of blend like my original idea. The colors won't be exactly the same, but I think I can make it work.

Leaf Quilt Design

 I haven't quilted the Wiley Way top I finished two weeks ago, but I am thinking about it. I love having fleece as the backing for quilts. It's snuggly and feels good, but in our house it's not quite warm enough, so I think I'll add a layer of batting and use the fleece for the backing. That should warm it up.

I was going through some old sketches I made for quilt ideas and saw one that was three leaves on a couple of branches. I played with it some and decided I want to make it a bed quilt, or at least a lap quilt and not a wallhanging.

I played around in paint, and came up with this. The background won't be so blended, but I want to make it with lots of squares so there will be a blend of colors. I didn't originally plan to have the leaves break through the border, but I really like how it looks.

I have no idea how I'll construct this, but at the moment, I think it looks really good.

Those are supposed to be aspen leaves. I live in Colorado, so the leaves change, and we see those colors of leaves through the year.

Here is the large pattern. I ended up moving this a couple of times until I could find a place to hang the paper. It's about 60" x 87" (the paper) and I wasn't able to get the projector to make a large enough image to fill the paper, so the size of the quilt may just change.

Speaking of changes...

...yesterday

...today.

Gotta love Colorado. 245 sunny days per year!