Creating Your Own Designs

Today's post is all about creating your own quilt designs!
When I was young, I used to spend a lot of time drawing.
Animals were always my favourite subject.

And of all that past practice must have been a strong influence on my creative self because I have been designing my own quilts since I started quilting.  I wanted to make a quilt for my daughter and I found inspiration in the things that she liked.  Erin loves her cat, Fluffy.  She loves to read books.  I showed her the plan for her quilt and asked for her input concerning the colour scheme.  Erin added the little mouse to the top of the bookshelf.

Following the making of Erin's Krazy Katz quilt, I did a lot of applique work.
And then I decided to experiment more with piecing.

After purchasing a flannel backed table cloth, and tacking that up as a design wall, I was inspired to create an improv quilt.

It started out less about drawing and more about playing.  Or so I thought.
I gathered up some colourful scraps and pieced together some random sized blocks.  It was fun.  But then I had to figure out how to piece them into a quilt.  Figuring out the size of the background pieces was not as easy as it looks either.  Quilt math has been known to be fatal.

 

I drew plans all this summer while my kids were swimming at the pool.
Maybe all that water soaked my brain.  Is that where the fish came from?
Graph paper is a great tool for designing quilts.

It is difficult for me to imagine just how a quilt will look in fabric though.  I knew that using design software would allow for the use of downloaded fabric swatches that could be placed into the drawings.  So I broke down and ordered EQ7.  I am still new at it, but catching on.

It amazes me to see the difference changing one element of the colourway can make!

This post is my entry for part 6 of the Sewing With Certainty Series, hosted by my friend Jessica of Quilty Habit.  Why don't you join me over at her place and check out all the others who have linked up?!!  While you're at it, if you haven't been following along, click on the pretty picture to visit Jessica.  From her page you can click on all the past weeks' link ups!

Keep On Quilting On!