Two hundred fifty-three days into our coronavirus stay at home stint, and the Plant Worry Grow HOPE quilt pattern is finally ready for release! This pattern includes 14 different foundation paper pieced block patterns, including a taste of appliqué with the three large tree tops, as well as three different project ideas: a lap quilt, a table runner, and a pillow. It is now available for purchase in my Payhip shop, and 50% of all profits will be donated to charities that are working to grow hope in my community.
Sewing these trees has been my balm during the past many months, and I am excited to be able to share them with you. The forest always brings me solace, so being able to stitch my worries away as I slowly built this quilty forest of hope has been a big help these past months. I hope that the serenity of sewing helps bring you some peace and hope as we buckle down and renew our stay at home efforts as the coronavirus cases steeply rise once more.
The lap quilt option finishes at 53″ x 60″ and can be made larger or smaller simply by including more or less trees. I’m looking forward to wrapping up in this quilt once we get through this pandemic!
The pillow option finishes at 20″ x 20″ but can also be customized by switching out different tree options, or by choosing different fabrics. There’s also a table runner option that finishes at 12″ x 53″ and will certainly brighten any setting.
This pattern is available for an introductory $14 for the first week, after which it will be its standard $18. Fifty percent of profits from the first month of sales will be donated to the following three organizations:
- Waldo County Bounty, which is working to improve food security for ALL people in my county here in rural Maine during the COVID-19 crisis;
- Reparations Maine, a mutual aid project working to connect land owners with descendants of enslaved Africans and other indigenous people who want deeded land on occupied Wabanaki Confederacy territory in Maine; and,
- The For Us By Us Fund, a flexible funding and organizing initiative that seeks to support the creative and organizing efforts of People of Color (PoC) in Maine.
While my first quilt top is complete, I’m certainly not finished sewing these trees. Coronavirus cases are again on the rise, and the fight toward an antiracist country that values and supports all people is going to be a long road.
Head over and buy Plant Worry Grow Hope now, and join me in burying some worries with a needle and thread, and watching the hope grow.
With a focus on hope and new beginnings, I thought today would be the perfect day to re-release my updated Bean Sprout block pattern, since there’s nothing like a freshly sprouted plant to celebrate spring, new life, and the wonder of discovery. As many of you likely know, I’ve been working with the amazing 
With a bit more pattern details, more professional layout, and an added block size (welcome, dear 4″x6″ block!), the newest Bean Sprout block pattern includes all of the great things from the original 2016 design, but in a clearer, crisper presentation. You can buy it now from my 
You can see a few other versions of this block I’ve sewn up in the past in its 
I particularly love the idea of a pillow, and very well might be making another one of these someday soon. I’d love to see what YOU make with the pattern, so please use #beansproutblock and tag me 
Amanda 
Note that Amanda chose to add her own personal touch by sewing vertical stripes into the side borders; that bit is not included in the Staggered pattern.
Anja of 
Darlene 
For this quilt, she used Giucy Giuce’s Spectrastic fabrics paired with Libs Eliott’s Venom fabric for the background, both by Andover fabrics, and it’s so much fun. I love how adding a non-solid background fabric changes the aesthetic of Staggered. You can find Darlene on Instagram 
Natasha 
Shannon Spicer 
Kerry of 
Ultimately I decided to widen the center of the Twin size so that the overall aesthetic and assembly for each size was more similar, so the Twin version included in the Staggered pattern is this one, with two additional columns. Debbie Griffiths 
She used an Alison Glass Sun Print 2016 jelly roll plus the “Path” (text) prints from the Sun Print 2019 with Robert Kaufman Manchester Metallic in Licorice (black with gold sparkle) as the background, and holy smokes does it shimmer and shine!!! Alyson had a pretty epic photo shoot for this quilt, too, complete with video to show how much the gold metallic shines in the sun when the wind blows.
You can start to see the gold glimmer in this photo, but be sure to head over to her Instagram feed at 
Staggered is a fun, easy, extremely versatile pattern that is a great way to showcase your favorite fabric line. Perfect for precuts, this would be a fantastic pattern for that precious fat quarter bundle or jelly roll you have stashed away. I used the new Alison Glass Sun Print 2020 fabrics by Andover Fabrics for mine, and it seriously brightens my day. My kids are already asking who gets the finished quilt! I especially love how the Menagerie fabric from Sun Print adds some twinkle among the other rich range of colors. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love Alison Glass fabrics, and this *might* be my favorite line of hers so far.
The range of greens-teals-blues are especially to die for! I just love how they play in this Staggered quilt. You can probably tell, but I’m smitten!
I quilted my Staggered quilt using coordinating 50wt Aurifil threads– I have another fun release to share–from my very own curated collection of Aurifil threads, called 
I also created a Facebook group called 
You probably remember the improv, make-it-up-as-I-go 
I’ve been wanting to create a pattern exclusively for 
It was tough to limit myself to just a few of the colors, but with my design I had to pick my top favorites. Turquoise and magenta won the day, and that perfect purple print with both turquoise and magenta details, called Energy in Berry, was the perfect middle man! Plus, I can’t think of a better fabric name to go in a Superbolt!
I quilted Superbolt with a variety of color-coordinating Aurifil 50wt and 40wt threads. I quilted straight lines in the lighting bolt white sections using 50wt thread in 2600-Dove and the walking foot on my Bernina 560. I’ve been wanting to practice free motion quilting ever since taking 
I used a different design in each colored section, and tried to choose mostly curved designs for the darker areas, with more angular and sharp designs for the light ones. I used 40wt 1148-Light Jade in the teal section (Charisma in Seafoam from Panache), 50wt 2535-Magenta in the purple (Energy in Berry), and 40wt 1100-Red Plum in the bright pink (Spirit in Pink). Because the thread color blends in so well, it’s hard to see how fantastic my free motion quilting was, so you’ll just have to take my word for it! LOL
I found the perfect backing fabric for this mini in my stash, Aloe Vera in Candy from Pretty Potent by Anna Maria Horner, and with the addition of a few leftover blocks from the mini quilt top, it came together as a really fun quilt back.
The striped fabric makes a perfect binding, but also makes a great label! I took the photo before I hand stitched the top edge, and don’t mind that top stray thread that escaped my snips, but I love how easy the stripes made it to write in a straight line! I usually kilter when I write, so having that extra guide was super helpful.
Staggered also includes a link to instructions for a bonus rainbow binding, since I couldn’t help but extend that rainbow off the edge of the quilt. So much fun!
Night Quilter 