Hi, I’m Kristen from KD-Quilts. It is no lie that I love Tula Pink! My favorite quilts in my living room are made with her lines (Plume, Nest and now my Birds and the Bees)
When Sara sent out the email about her sew along I was thrilled to be a part of it…after all, it gave me an excuse to have to get all of the Birds and the Bees prints from Miss Tula. Because I needed an excuse?! I made her Stacks pattern from her book: Quilts from the House of Tula Pink. Stacks measures at 72 x 90. I’m tall so I love that it is a really long quilt. It’s technically twin size, but I think of it as more lap size!
I have always wanted to make one of those wonky, random pieced lines quilts but never got around to it. And to be honest, I was thinking that you cut random background pieces and sewed them to the bars. I mean, I guess that is one way to do it. But the technique in this book is so clever! It’s one of those “that makes so much sense, of COURSE it should be done like that” moments. And her hand drawn illustrations are so clear, there is no room for confusion!
I wanted the quilting on this one to look awesome. There was a lot of negative space that just screamed for some fancy quilting. I made swirly hooks a la Angela Walters all over the gray background. It turned out amazingly. The swirls actually look like the squirrels tails in the fabric from Birds and the Bees! In the “stacks” I just quilted wavy lines. I didn’t want any of the quilting to take away from the prints, so I left it simple. There are flowers outlining the pinwheels. I chose a solid backing with gray thread so that the quilting would show up nicely on the back. I would say that this would be an excellent quilt for a beginner. It looks really tricky, but with Tula’s illustrations and directions, it becomes very straight forward and fun to create.
This is one of my fave’s from the book! I remember reading through it the first time and thinking “why didn’t I think of that” when she was telling how to piece those bars! That clever Tula!
Your quilt looks great here too Kristen!
So beautiful in the photos Kristen!!! Even more beautiful in person! I am so happy I got to see it!
That is my favorite pattern from the book. I have a stack of V&Co. “Simply Color” that I have designated for it.
Beautiful x
17 1/2″ good grief! Still, makes it all easier to go together in the end…
I also learned the hard way (after buying many fat quarters) that, with the correction you mentioned, fat quarters don’t work – you need 1/4 yard cuts to have enough fabric for the print cuts listed.
If only I’d read this before cutting my fabric! I thought 3-1/4″ was unusual but checked the book twice & re-watched Sewing with Nancy. Interestingly, Nancy said “3-1/2″ but the writing on the tag on top of the squares was 3-1/4”.