MisDirection Pattern Release

Last year I was lucky enough to have one of my quilt designs - MisDirection - selected to be included in the 2015 QuiltCon Magazine. And this pattern is now available to purchase in my Craftsy store and my PayHip store!!!

Misdirection explores the versatility of the half square rectangle, taking chevron quilts to a whole new level. Inspired by the Sixties, this quilt features bold bands of colour and negative space created with low volume prints. It is a great quilt to showcase free motion quilting in the ample negative space, and could be made using either prints as in this version, or solid fabrics. The 10-page pattern includes full instructions and diagrams to make a 72" x 72" quilt. 

I had an awesome group of testers who worked through this pattern for me. I love each and every one of these versions - they are great examples of how different this quilt can look based on colour and fabric choice!

First up is Jess's version. I love how these saturated colours pop against the low volume background. And Jess obviously had a ball quilting the negative space - it's a great example of how much fun you can have with the quilting on this quilt!

I love how different Jen's quilt looks with a darker background. Jen used solids for her quilt, and it has resulted in a very graphic, bold quilt. I love this version!

I love how Ella's version has the chevron dissolving into the background - and it's such a fresh combination of colours.

Leslie's version of MisDirection is just lovely - by using several different values of each of the three colours, the quilt top has so much sparkle! It's such a great colour combo, too!

Kirsten's version is absolutely spectacular - I love that pop of lime green against all the neutrals. And how amazing is the texture from the straight line quilting?

And last but certainly not least is Leanne's fabulously summery version. This one makes me think of watermelon, it's so fresh and pretty!

A massive thank you to all of my pattern testers, you've all done such an amazing job with this pattern. I love to see people's versions of my patterns, so if you make this quilt, please use #misdirectionquilt and tag me (@elvengardenquilts) if you share it on social media!!

xx Jess

QuiltCon 2015 Magazine!!

I cannot believe how fast February went! Between the organisation involved in getting to QuiltCon, being in Austin for a week, and then attempting to get back to normal life, it felt like a ridiculously short month. I've been a bit of a zombie since I got home, and although I do have a few blog posts worth of stuff to say about QuiltCon (when I can articulate it all properly), for now I just want to share with you my favorite quilt I made last year. It appears in the just-released QuiltCon magazine (eeeeeep!!), along with some fantastic articles and stunning modern quilts.

I made this quilt - Misdirection - to a very tight deadline (I think I had three weeks from finding out it had been accepted and needing to post it), but it was such a fun quilt to make - I really enjoyed focusing on it and getting it finished. I adore the colour combo of navy, green and gold against low volume greys, and it was fun to design a quilt with so much negative space to play with.

This quilt uses half rectangle triangles (HRTs) to create the design. I've become a bit fascinated with HRTs - I love the angles HRTs create, especially long rectangles, and it's a shape I plan on playing with very soon :o) The angles in the design made it pretty easy to choose quilting designs, and to help work out how to break up the negative space.

 I used 50wt Aurifil for all the quilting, and matched my thread colours as much as possible to each coloured section. The background is all Dove (which blends freakishly well into all low volume fabrics I've tried it on). I did use my walking foot for all the long straight line quilting - I wanted them to be really straight, and I knew how impossible that would be for lines that long if I tried FMQ. The rest of the quilting is reasonably large (1/2" or so spacing) so although it has lots of quilting, it is still a really snuggly quilt.

To break up the background area, I did mark the some of the long diagonal lines before I started quilting. From there it was simply a matter of quilting each of the sections, alternating my favorite pebble/swirl combo with sections that repeat some of the designs from the coloured sections. I think one of the reasons I love low volume backgrounds so much is that they behave like a solid in terms of showing quilting, but they have a subtle texture as well. Having a pieced background made it really easy to mark the quilt too ;o)

It is so nice to finally be able to share this quilt. I'd love it to be mine, but as soon as I designed it my 7 year old son made it pretty clear he'd love it. So it can join the nest of quilts on his bed for a while :o) I'm hoping I'll start blogging a bit more regularly soon. I have so much I'd like to say about QuiltCon - but in a nutshell, it was about the people. It was amazing to meet so many people I have connected with online, and I was constantly amazed how easy it was to transition from chatting via email to chatting face to face. Thanks to everyone who I was lucky enough to spend time with in Austin, it was an incredible experience, made more so by all the wonderful people I met.

xx Jess