in an old house in paris that was covered in vines
lives 12 little girls in two straight lines...
the smallest one was madeline.
back in the beginning of the year, which seems like 10 years ago at this rate, we were given our next mini quilt challenge for sacMQG, and it was one that i was determined to participate in. i knew instantly which book i wanted to do, and a general idea of what aspect of the book i wanted to include.
madeline is a series that takes me back to elementary school, to my favorite teacher and her halloween costumes. each year mrs. blake would dress up in the same costume. she would be a nun, specifically, miss clavel, and carry around a large madeline doll. well, you can see for yourself here:)
most recent photo there on the right was from 2017, which was the last time a bunch of us got together in person. she moved to the east coast after retirement to be with her granddaughters, but is now back on the west coast and not too far away! because of her, and the amazing four years i had with her as my teacher, madeline has always held a special place in my heart.
after a pinterest search for minimalist madeline designs, i came across
bookroo and a line of minimalist posters they had representing books. the one for madeline was perfect, but i couldn't find a designer to reach out to. i emailed the company and after a few back and forth responses, i was granted permission by the designer to create a personal mini quilt for this challenge using their design. here's the
link to the madeline poster that started this all.
and if you're a lover of children's books, you have got to
check out all the posters here
and then life got in the way. and covid-19. and all the things. so last wednesday night... yep. DAYS before the meeting, i got down to work and made this happen!
i knew i wanted the background blue instead of red to represent the coats the girls wear, so it was perfect that i still had a chunk of this blue grunge from the
hidden agenda quilt. and then after deciding on fabric in my stash for a baby quilt, this rejected yellow became exactly what i needed for madeline's hat. of course, the bit of black grunge was just what was needed to finish off the bows ad the strings hanging down.
i appliqued the pieces on to the blue one layer at a time, and just did a basic stitch around the edge to keep things in place. at first, i was going to attempt another new skill and use my free motion foot to quilt a squiggle pattern in the background, but i quickly learned (after practicing on a scrap) that i didn't want to dive in to that just yet without the complete proper set up... if ever. i find that maneuvering on the long arm is much more my style instead of maneuvering the fabric.
so instead, i quilted the background with my walking foot. in my original plans, i wanted to quilt an eiffel tower outline on one side, but nerves and time crunch got the best of me. i opted for a design similar to the
ninja turtle quilt but as time went on, i started getting more choppy and overlapping lines to make it more dense. i also stitched around the hat detail to make it "pop" a little more, and left that unquilted. since it is intended to be a wall hanging, it shall just hang.
also...
the backing is perfect.
i bought this fabric when i was making my
100 blocks quilt, and had just the right size for the backing.
i still have a little bit more, which will very likely be used with the quilt i intend to make for mrs. blake this year. she loves to travel, so i have a perfect fat quarter bundle i purchased just to represent that. it wouldn't be complete without a little madeline with it as well!
pattern information:
madeline bookroo poster designed by jane tanner
quilt count: 131
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