Whimsical Quilts

We recently did the Tucson Quilt Fiesta. On set up day one of our customers, Sally Dickinson, walked me through the show to see her quilts that were entered in the show. She won ribbons for some of them. One of her quilts was a Sumo Wrestler quilt. Each wrestler has a different animal print for his loincloth. It is from a Japanese paper pieced pattern. The alternating blocks and layout are her own design. Sally told me that it was a little tricky finding animal prints that were the correct scale.

Sumo Wrestler Wardrobe by Sally Dickinson

Each day as I came into the show I saw a few different quilts. Some were just spectacular and some were just plain fun. So I decided that when I had the opportunity to "Power Walk" the show to see the quilts on Sunday morning, to look at it from a whimsical perspective. I went in search for some "fun" quilts to write about.

Here's a Halloween quilt called "Haunted Cottage" made by Jain Barrett. She turned a drawing into a quilt and pattern. She worked with Quilters Market to create a fabric kit for it to raise money for Quilt for a Cause. The pattern is available for free on their website at http://quiltforacause.org/haunted-cottage-wall-hanging/.

Haunted Cottage by Jain Barrett

There are a lot of skeleton themed quilts out there and generally I'm not a big fan of them. But this one struck my fancy. It is kind of a self-portrait of the quilt artist Tami Graeber. She made it for the Saddlebrooke-Friday Quilters Club President's Challenge. The theme was Arizona Centennial. "Vaquera Rae" was created in her image with a red ponytail and ex-cowgirl.

Vaquera Rae Celebrates the Arizona Centennial
by Tami Graeber

Next we have "Crazy Cats" by Dottie Lanier.  The eyes and flower centers were digitized and the flower stems were machine appliqued. Each cat has his own personality. Very cute! The quilt was machine quilted by Arlys Bjorke.

Crazy Cats by Dottie Lanier

Frogs & Bugs for Theresa was made by Becky Ruhl for her four year old granddaughter. Her niece Mary Watson designed the bugs for the frogs and Becky embroidered additional bugs to even out the design. It was quilted by Barb Angerhofer. It is definitely a bright and cheerful quilt! I love the binding fabric. It ties in all of the colors from the quilt and frames it very perfectly.

Frogs & Bugs for Theresa by Becky Rul

I hope you enjoyed this fun tour of some of the quilts from the show.

Happy Quilting, 

Carol