How Liquorice Allsorts made a Dream Come True

When I first started quilting I never in a million years thought I would get to a point where I would design my own patterns or have anything I made appear in a magazine, but today sees two of those things happen in such an amazing way that it brings a tear to my eye if I stop and think about it. Nearly 2 years ago I woke in the middle of the night having dreamt of a quilt pattern inspired by Liquorice Allsorts that I had to make. I got out of bed, used my phone as a torch and stumbled through the house to my desk where I hurriedly scribbled down notes on what the pattern was.

I held on to those notes with a plan in my head about how I’d translate that dream into reality once I’d found the time. I look back at that sketch now and chuckle. It shows just how little I knew about quilt making and how truly horrible I am at quilt math, but it’s all mine and I love it. I did that sketch on the 16th September 2013.

Then last year when I was playing in Sewvivor I got the most amazing email from a lovely lady named Alice. Alice wrote to me to ask me if she could feature my blog in the magazine she worked for, Love Patchwork & Quilting. I still remember clear as a bell sitting at my sewing machine working on my Naughty-cal Weekender when my phone pinged with an email alert and I opened it to find that email there.

I don’t think I have ever moved so quickly up and out of my sewing chair and into the lounge room. I did a little happy dance as I told HUBBY about the email and raced to the computer to pen my reply (all the while hoping I sounded way cooler than the hysterical mess I was). Love Patchwork & Quilting did a really lovely piece on my blog and it’s still one of the things that sits on my inspiration board pushing me on when I’m feeling like I’m nuts for wanting to do what I do. 

Alice and I kept emailing and she was kind enough to suggest that I do a project with Love Patchwork & Quilting and I jumped at the chance. I pitched a tonne of ideas to her and Jen, including that crazy little idea I’d had in the middle of the night.

Out of all the ideas that I pitched I never thought that one would get chosen, but Jen saw something in it that I didn’t and she commissioned me to make the quilt and 2 matching cushions.

In January I wrote a post that hinted at the work I was doing and in February I sent my quilt and cushions off on an adventure to London without me. I was so nervous about sending my work in. I adore Love Patchwork & Quilting. In my eyes they’re one of the best quilting magazines on the market and it had been a goal of mine to get my work published in their pages, I just didn’t think it would happen so soon into my quilting adventure.

I think I must have sent a million text messages to Gemma (of Pretty Bobbins) the entire time I worked on the quilt and cushions asking her if I was crazy, if my work was good enough and would something I quilted myself (the cushions) be good enough for Love Patchwork & Quilting. I was so desperate to not disappoint Alice and Jen after they’d taken a big chance with me.

Jen asked for the quilt to be made in pastels and I have to confess I thought she was nuts. Me + pastels… it’s not normally my go-to palette. When I’d pitched the quilt I had thought of using bright bold modern colours (image a rainbow) with a strong black to represent the liquorice. But I trusted Jen knew what she was after and so I ordered Robert Kaufman’s Kona Cotton New Pastel Jelly Roll and teamed it with Robert Kaufman’s Kona Cotton Steel for the dark strips.

Even after the fabrics arrived I wasn’t convinced. I really struggled to come to terms with the softer colours. But a few blocks into the process and I was sold. As it came together on my design wall I got my first hint that things could work out ok.

This quilt really pushed me to learn new things as the circle blocks are a mix of hand appliqué and machine appliqué. I wanted to offer people two options so they could play to their strengths. The non circular quilt blocks are just strips of jelly roll pieced to follow the allsorts candy patterns. They go together so quickly and they’re big blocks (10″ square finished) so you don’t need a lot of them to make a striking quilt. Because the block’s are a mix and match of patterns you can make as many as you like of one pattern or skip a pattern altogether if you want a certain look. It’s all about mixing and having fun.

Gemma (of Pretty Bobbins) kindly did a rush job of quilting the quilt with an edge-to-edge hexagon pattern that gives the quilt a lovely bit of texture. The quilt is quilted in Aurifil’s #2510 – Light Lilac (which can be found in my Aussie Aurifil Club Bundle!). I used the left over jelly roll strips to make a scrappy binding that I just love and plays to the quilt pattern. I quilted the cushions and used a mix of straight lines and curves. I really love the quilting with appliqué overlay and I have Gemma to thank for that suggestion. I’m also secretly loving the curved pattern on the square cushion and can see me trying that one again very soon (I used a bread plate!).

But the most amazing thing of all isn’t in the quilting, the pattern or the fact that I made something with pastels… it’s this…

Yep, that’s the cover. The cover of a magazine that I had on my dream list of who I’d like to work with. I am so humbled and thankful to the team at Love Patchwork & Quilting for taking a chance on me and then making that chance even more amazing by putting my crazy late night confection inspired quilt on the front cover of their beautiful magazine. I still can’t quite comprehend that it’s on there and that I’m not simply dreaming all this.

One of the main reasons I wanted to work with Love Patchwork & Quilting is the attention to detail with styling and presenting the work of the creatives. You can tell that the team behind Love Patchwork & Quilting care as much about the projects they receive as the people that make them, and that’s priceless. To see something that I made in my sewing room styled and in print within this amazing magazine is such an amazing joy and something I will always cherish.