Butterfly Fantasy Quilt and GIVEAWAY!

Earlier in the year the lovely folks at Free Spirit Fabrics asked if I’d join in with their Murmur Fabric Influencer Tour.  Murmur is the new fabric collection from one of my favourite designer’s Valori Wells, so of course I said ‘Yes please!’.

A beautiful box full of the new collection arrived a few weeks later (a while ago now as you can see by the frost in this photo) and I have since been patiently awaiting my stop on the tour.

Well it’s finally here!  I am very excited to show you what I have been making.

And read on to enter a giveaway to win some of the Murmur fabric for yourself!

But first a little bit about the fabric collection which is actually Valori’s 41st collection! Wow! She uses photography and block printing to create her beautiful artworks, before turning them into fabric designs. This collection was inspired by the hummingbirds that visit her garden every year and the 300 sunflowers that she has planted with her kids!

I absolutely adore this fabric collection, it has been a joy to design with and I love everything I have made with it.

Here is the full list of stops on the Influencer Tour, go check them out and see all the gorgeous makes:

Before I started on the project for the tour I used the fabric for some of my class samples like these improv baskets from my Modern Sampler Quilt evening course.

I then used the fabrics to make a whole quilt for a Today’s Quilter magazine (which you will see in a few months time!).

These HST are part of this new quilt.

When I went to Sweden to teach my New York Beauty class I used the Murmur fabric again for my class samples. And this got me thinking about the NYB block and how I could use it in a new way…

I made more New York Beauty blocks and, as I have been extremely busy these last few months, when my sister Jane visited at Easter she also helped by making the FPP part of the blocks – thanks Jane!

Meanwhile I made quilted panels from the improv basket blocks and turned them into a pouch.

I used Aurifil 12wt variegated thread to quilt the wavy lines. I used 50wt in the bobbin and a size 90 needle. It works so well and looks like a neat hand stitched back stitch!

And finally I began to turn those NYB blocks into these crazy butterflies!

At first I did think about making them hummingbirds but the design didn’t work as well as the butterfly and I loved the idea of adding those tiny applique circles as antennae.

Unfortunately I didn’t have time to finish the whole quilt but a quilt top is almost as good and it means we’ll get a chance to revisit this project again when I finish it!

And I do intend to produce a pattern for this block soon. It’s a great mix of FPP, curves and tiny bit of needle-turn applique.

I was going to call the blocks Fantasy Butterflies (as they look like something out of a film like Avatar!) but my friend Sarah Ashford was visiting me this week and she suggested switching the words around – so Butterfly Fantasy it is!

And now to the GIVEAWAY!

EDITED 20th May 2019

Thank you so much to everyone who entered the giveaway, which is now CLOSED.

The winner was Paula Collings, comment number 25.

Congratulations Paula!

Free Spirit are providing a pre-cut fabric bundle as a giveaway and all you need to do is comment below.  You can tell me anything you like! I will choose a winner through the random number generator and Free Spirit will send you the bundle.

The giveaway is open to international entries and closes at midnight UK time on Sunday 19th May. GOOD LUCK!

Meanwhile I am giving away the pouch, my left over scraps and some Aurifil thread on my Instagram feed! Why not head over there and enter that giveaway too!