Wistful Winds Archives • Stitches Quilting

Wistful Winds Half Square Triangles Radiating Hope

Wistful Winds is a fabric collection designed by Shari Butler of Doohikey Design for Riley Blake Fabrics. If you haven’t met Shari yet – then you have to visit her on her blog at Doohikey Design. Shari is just a gentle person with the kindest spirit! You will LOVE her! This sweet bundle has been sitting next to me inspiring many creations buzzing in my mind. I sorted and re-sorted the fabrics many times thinking of dozens of things to create. Do you do this with fabric you love? Arrange and rearrange it daydreaming of so many things to make!

This of course was one of my many layouts…. I just love everything about this bright cheery garden collection of fabrics. The florals are beautiful with so many coordinates of pin stripes, polka dots, geometrics, and tone on tone florals. Don’t you love the wooden beads and the zig zag stitching? I was so drawn to Shari’s feature print with the delicate girls enjoying the garden and wistful being lifted by twirling flowers.

I’m crushing over the rainbow color range of bright cherry oranges, reds, yellows, blues, pinks, greens and whites. Wistful Winds is versatile and can be used in many different ways! I can imagine quilts, bags, skirt, and more for an adult along with an entire range of goodies to create for a newborn or child! There are so many coordinates to incorporate into any project!

Below is a wind chime that I made from a wooden embroidery hoop using each of the 18 coordinates of Wistful Winds. I loved using the colorful Riley Blake selvages with the bright clouds depicting the colorways in the fabric. Isn’t that just the cutest! A wooden bead is at the top of each strip of fabric that hangs down. I then cut 1.5 inch diamonds from the coordinates and used a 5 inch thimble ruler to cut fabrics from the feature pieces. To give the fabric some structure I used Pellon interfacing.

I loved seeing this collection hanging outside in nature that with the gentle breeze playing with the fabrics.

Of course I couldn’t resist making just one item with this collection. I had many ideas for quilts and totes and more! I don’t know about you but I just love half square triangles! They are very easy to make and decided to use a Cloud Solid White to accentuate the beautiful bright colors. For the center of the quilt I turned four of the colorful squares towards each other and then turned the other half square triangles to radiant outward. It was my way of expressing the meaning behind the Wistful Winds Fabric collection into hope radiating outward.

Isn’t is just beautiful? I need quilting ideas! How would you quilt this beauty to express Shari’s meaning of hope for this fabric? Let’s brainstorm and then I will

To make this quilt I cut 32 – 6 inch squares of the Wistful Winds Collection. I used all of the fabrics from the collection except the stripes because I want to combine those for the binding. I also cut 32 – 6 inch squares of Riley Blake Cloud White Solid. You can see below how I used a ruler and pencil on each 6 inch square of the white fabric to mark a stitching line down the diagonal.

To create the half square triangles stitch down a 1/4 inch seam on either side of the pencil line. The photo below shows you my white Aurifil 50 weight thread on either side of the stitching line.

For the each color of the feature fabric with the Wistful Wind Girls I actually cut a 10 inch by 6 inch rectangle to then be able to fussy cut the girls the direction I wanted along with alternating the position of the girls on the finished cut triangle. You can see how I did this below.

After stitching each of the half square triangles along the stitch line, I then used the pencil line as a cutting line to create two half square triangle blocks. I then had 64 blocks to work with and turned them round and round along with changing the colors around to get the following layout that I stitched together.

This then finishes to a completed lap quilt in the dimensions of 40 inches by 40 inches. Of course additional rows can be added to increase the size of the quilt.

Now let’s brainstorm together a plan to quilt this quilt! What design ideas do you have? I can use my long arm or my domestic machine so the options are endless. Please share ideas.

Wistful Winds Fabric can be purchased right here at Stitches Quilting. To celebrate the release of Wistful Winds, Stitches Quilting will be giving away a Fat Quarter Bundle of the collection. To enter the giveaway, comment below with your tip about the quilting of the Wistful Winds Radiant Hope Quilt and subscribe to Stitches Quilting. If you share on social media be sure to use the hashtag #StitchesQuiltingWistfulWindsGiveaway so I can find it for extra entries. We will be having fun with the Giveaway on Instagram too – so come socialize with us over there! Love to connect with all of YOU!

There have been so many uber talented women on the Wistful Winds Blog Tour. Be sure to stop by each of their sites to view the eye candy and patterns from each of them. You will be mesmerized and inspired! Below is the schedule of the blog posts!

The final day of blog posts is tomorrow when you will be able to read the designer Shari at Doohikey Designs to learn the meaning behind the fabric! I love fabric that has meaning to it!

October 3rd: Amy Sinibaldi – www.nanaCompany.typepad.com

Kristyne Czepuryk – www.prettybyhand.com

October 4th: Amanda Niederhauser – www.jedicraftgirl.com

Amy Smart – www.diaryofaquilter.com

October 5th: Meagan Taylor/Kristi Jones – www.meagsandme.com

Christine Cook – www.stitchingrevival.com

October 6th: Elea Lutz – www.elealutzdesign.com

Jodie Carleton – www.vintagericrac.blogspot.com

October 7th: Sedef Imer – www.downgrapevinelane.com

Jina Barney – jinabarneydesignz.com

October 10th: Elizabeth Evans – www.simplesimonandco.com

Kimberly Bourne – www.mainstreetmarketdesigns.com