Monet Quilt - An Easy Going Quilt That Feels Like a Holiday

I really loved making these honeycomb flowers. I've discovered a great way to make sure I get a good spread of colour by sewing all the shapes into pairs, then the pairs into half blocks, and then the half blocks into finished flowers. I did that here over about a week of evenings and suddenly they were done! After feeling kind of stuck on my scrappy Evensong and my fussy cut Ice Cream Soda, and just with life in general with the sudden winter plunge into short, dark days, it was such a relief to make hardly any decisions, to just to rest in the colours doing their work for me. 

Taking the papers out and pressing the blocks ready for applique is far less fun, but I felt so ready for a change from just EPP that I pushed through with that reward in mind. I hand appliqued these blocks over the following week or so in every moment available listening to an Emily Henry novel in my headphones, and I just let the world fade away. I enjoyed making progress on something that was EASY to make progress on. It didn't require self-control or self-bribery. It was something I looked forward to when I was doing other things.

I cut and added the strips over two days. It's been so long -- SO LONG -- since I was able to sew for two days and almost finish a quilt top. I've embraced the slow pace of English paper piecing, and usually I'm completely happy taking my time, but this felt like a holiday. Like a whirlwind trip. It's going to take me 5 years to visit all the tourist spots in my local area because I have everyday life to do, but when I went to New York, I saw everything I wanted to in 3 days. 

I was so chuffed with how my quilt top turned out! I had chosen a design where I could just relax into the scrappy magic, rather than make a million decisions all the way through, and it worked. In my life right now there is so little quiet and so little natural light, and this quilt didn't need either for me to enjoy it coming together. 

Did you see the perfect backing I found?! It's Anna Maria Horner's Swanmore Small in Afternoon. It's just so wonderfully Monet-like, it felt like a special gift from the universe when I saw it. Then, after auditioning lots of different blue bindings, I found this black by Guicy Guice and it just made the whole quilt sing, even more than it was singing to me already. Because I always try to make binding from my stash, I generally find something ‘good enough’, but I love how this brings out the darker prints in the quilt and increases the contrast. 

As I made this quilt, I read about Monet. I've been inspired especially by the way he made space for and nurtured his creativity. He travelled for it, made a garden for it, built a studio for it, and pushed through his own misgivings when war raged around him and he felt like he should be doing more. I don't have the money for travel or my own studio, and the garden is coming along slowly, but I still wonder what I can do to keep honouring my creativity and valuing the space it takes up in this world. 

At least one thing I've come to is that it includes making more easy going quilts like Monet. Quilts that fit with my natural flow like a key in a lock. Quilts that don't need all the stars to align to make progress, that don't demand too much, that hang out happily in my mind when I can't be with them, and greet me warmly when I return, easily slipping back into where we left off. 

If that sounds like something you'd love too, then I genuinely recommend Monet Quilt. Choose between the PDF pattern alone or the 3 in 1 bundle (PDF, papers, acrylic template) and enjoy the easy journey through various patchwork techniques!