My Texas Mini Quilt Swap package made it safely to my partner yesterday, so I can safely share what I made! The major item of course was the mini itself, which I hemmed and hawed and debated over several different designs. After considering several different options that all incorporated a Texas shape, I finally changed directions completely and came up with this:
I took inspiration pretty directly from one of the things in her inspiration mosaic, and I really liked how it turned out! She said she liked beachy colors and so do I, so I also went with blues instead of a more traditional Texas red/white/blue theme. I’m happy with having made something that is Texas-y but not CRAZY Texas-y.
The letters and cowboy boots were all made using Shannon Brinkley’s scrappy bits applique method. This was my first time trying it, and one of the few times I’ve ever done applique at all. It was fun, and I really like the results! I suspect I’ll use it again sometime in the future.
The blue fabrics are a mix of Alison Glass, Elizabeth Olwen, a Cloud 9 print that I picked up at Joann’s, and Kona solids. The background is a mix of Cotton + Steel basics left over from past projects and Kona white.
You can see the quilting a bit better on the back since the white thread stands out against the blue. I echoed the shapes of the letters and boots, and then sewed horizontal lines across the rest of the background. I sewed the binding on with my machine and didn’t have to fix a single spot! Hooray for that.
The swap also called for an extra! My partner mentioned that she loves bluebonnets, and I considered doing some embroidery but was running short on time for that. Instead, I came across this folded paper card on Pinterest that I thought would look great as a paper-pieced quilt block. I drew up a pattern in Illustrator and was very happy to find that it did indeed translate flawlessly to paper piecing. Once I’d finished the block, I quickly turned it into a cute tote bag using Purl Soho’s Easy Tote tutorial. The outer bag is the same lightweight denim I used last year for my Poolside Tote, and the lining (which you can’t see in these pictures) is the light blue flowery fabric I used in the mini quilt and bluebonnet block.
I also threw a few NASA goodies into the final package and overall, I was really happy with how everything turned out — and more importantly, my partner liked it too! And since I’ve forbidden myself from signing up for any swaps for the next 6 months since I’ll be mired in the newborn phase, so it was nice to have my “final” swap for a while turn out so well!