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Welcome to my part of the Riley Blake Virtual Quilt Market. 

  I feel like this post has been a long time coming; sixteen long, but dream filled years. With any dream it takes hard work, persistence, and determination.  I have loved being able to quilt for the past 20 years and creating a unique quilting style that has been mimicked throughout the quilting world, as well as designing patterns and writing books. This dream of designing fabric has always been in the background - until now.

About a year ago, I finally made this dream a reality by taking a class on Adobe Illustrator.  I have used the Adobe Illustrator program for years for writing my patterns and it's a little, okay, very - difficult... 

Taking this class gave me the courage to draw up my designs and make continuous patterns for fabric printing. I am happy to say that I am so much more confident in digital design, but still learning. 

I now had the courage to turn my drawings into digital patterns. I just needed to submit my designs to a manufacturer for a possible partnership.  Riley Blake Designs happened to be the perfect fit for me, so it was a pleasure to submit my portfolio to them.  Their team absolutely loved my fabric designs and the quilt patterns I designed to go along with each line.  

I signed a contract with them in August 2023.

Best day ever!

So, without further ado, I give you "Curated Blooms." This collection is a fun and beautiful combination of hand drawn flowers, swirls, and all things pointy. The colors of blues, greens, auburns, and creams are so delightful together. 

Each one of these swirls, flowers, and pointy things were meticulously drawn out and manipulated by hand to make a digital image version of my pencil drawings.  I now have full appreciation for the amount of hours it takes to bring a fabric line together. The above fabrics are the "main prints" in the Curated Blooms Collection. 

It is hard to choose a favorite grouping in a fabric line, but I REALLY love the leaves. This fabric will definitely be a beautiful low volume option.  

The auburn, cream, and midnight damask prints are also a favorite. 

 

These are the "Dance" prints and I love them as well.  With my advanced cuts, we missed the "blush dance" print.  However, it will be with the fabric line when it releases in November 2024. 

The "on-point" and "mosaic diamonds" are perfect filler designs. 

  

 What is fun is that I've designed 6 patterns to go along with the fabric.  All of the designs will release in November with the fabric. CrissCross is one of the designs that I have quilted up already.  It was difficult for me to quilt without a lot of detail, but I love how It turned out.  

 Once I have all of these designs pieced and quilted up, I will be able to get these patterns available, so stay tuned. I will keep you updated through this blog as well as my social media pages - @judi.madsen

I love sharing the backs of quilts, and this is no exception, even though it's a bit scarce on the details, lol. 

Exciting things await and November cannot come soon enough!  Please let your local quilt shop know that you want "Curated Blooms" with my pattern designs available. Also, I have the precuts and yardage available for pre-order at Green Fairy Quilts here. 

Thank you so much for your love, support, and encouragement throughout the years. I'm thrilled to be able to share my journey with you. 

Ok, this is going to be a long post.  I have not blogged in quite a while, but I feel like this project deserves the time and attention that only a blog can accomplish.

This quilt is 6 months in the making, not because I am that slow, but because life can be busy at times. While I love to quilt in heavy detail,  I do other projects at the same time, like writing my book Serenity.

This project is based on my Flower Patch quilt pattern.  I made a lot more blocks, and changed out the layout, which I will include at the end of this blog. You can get the original pattern here and that goes over the sizing and piecing instructions for the Flower Patch Block. 

This quilt is for my bed.  I  have changed my bedding several times over the years, but this one had to be made because I recently purchased a king size bed. It also answers the question of whether or not I use the quilts I spend so much time on.

  I fell in love with the fabric immediately when it came into our shop. The fabric is Chickadee by Create Joy Project for Moda Fabrics. I added some Moda Bella Solids for the sashings and pillows, I always love using solid fabrics when I quilt. 

My son still gives me flowers, he's 12 and he left this paper flower for me as a surprise.  It was the best surprise and one I had to share. 

This is the pillow backing, isn't it gorgeous?  It is a shame to cover, but at least I  have the picture for memory. 

I had 4 pillows that needed to be covered, so I decided that an exaggerated Flower Patch block would work the best!  I made two pieced blocks and quilted some fabrics to make the other two pillows.

 

It was really fun putting these pillows together and compliment the large quilt perfectly.

 I love the 60wt Glide thread because it's the perfect weight for high density quilting.  I  use white thread throughout because I want to showcase the quilting designs in the solid fabrics. I share a video on how to quilt this border design, you can see that here. I used my QuickMarkRuler and my A1 longarm ruler to draw and quilt out these designs.

This magenta corner is fabulous; seriously, it turned out so perfect. This corner is different than the top corner (pictured below) because of how the design lays out, but I love having different design elements in a quilt. It definitely gives it more character. 

The hardest part of the quilting process was seeing the marker on the darker fabric, but I like to use the purple disappearing marker for that. I have a large bright light that I use while I quilt and as long as that light is on, then the marker comes through perfectly on the darker fabrics. 

Here you can see the different corner design. Both are beautiful and give an awesome feel for the quilt. 

Here is a shot of the sashing.  I think my favorite part of designing the quilting is looking beyond the quilt blocks and incorporating the background of the pieced blocks to become part of the sashing.  It just changes the whole look of the quilt. 

And, the back! Oh my word, it's so amazing. I could easily use this as the front of the quilt for a bit of a change.

These last two pictures show just how amazing the fabric and the quilting designs work in unison to make an incredible quilt. Sometimes it is all about placement. I  must admit I am a bit nutty about fabric placement. Also, I am a bit nutty about line (stitch) placement because it does make a difference on a project. 

So, grab the original Flower Patch pattern here, then come back for the different/new layout listed below.

• 1/4 yard) Sash Squares - cut 3 strips 2 1/2” x WOF (width of fabric) strips, from these strips cut (42) 2 1/2 inch squares.

• 1 3/4 yards) Sash Strips - cut 5 strips 12 1/2” x WOF strips, from these strips cut (71) 12 1/2 x 2 1/2 inch rectangles.

• Squares border - cut (204) 2 1/2 inch squares from jelly rolls/scraps

• 1/3 yard) 1/2” Break border - cut (12) 1” x WOF strips 
• 7/8 yard) 2“ Border - cut (12) 2 1/2” x WOF strips
• 3 1/2 yards) 9 1/2” Border (12) 10” x WOF strips

 

I am so excited to share with you my newest pattern, Patchwork Tillie - now available in paper and PDF versions for $5 as a new release introductory sale for a limited time.

 

This quilt was a labor of love!  I had so much fun pulling fat quartersto make this darling quilt. This is a very scrappy quilt and I probably used about five different fabric lines to come up with the version here. I used...

 

I had a lot of fun with this beautiful carpenter's wheel quilt made by Elaine. I love her color choices. The leaves are falling around here and this quilt makes me think of fall. The fabrics are Flower Gatherings by Lisa Bongean of Primitive Gatherings and the pattern she used was from a Moda Love In sew along.  You can get the pattern and info here.  It is a layer cakepattern, conveniently we...

 

This was a fun project!  I designed this digital panel a while back for Honest Fabric and finally got a chance to quilt it up. This is a 51 x 60 panel and the Moss version of my Unhinged design.  I have 5 different colorways to choose from for this design, also available in 3 different sizes.  

 

This design has a lot going on with the block, so I decided that simple ruler work would be the best...

 

It has been fun posting about my Mama Gypsy, and the QAL that y'all participated in. It has been so great to see the projects and finished quilt tops in my Mama Gypsy Group. 

The above photo is a picture of the bonus HST quilt that I made with the leftover half-square triangles from Mama Gypsytop. I had a lot of fun putting the scraps together and creating this fun design. I also loved quilting it...

 

(Get the PDF here and paper version here)

Oh my word!! I am so excited to share Tillie with you!  Isn't she darling?  She's been in the works for months - it's one of those quilt patterns that takes time, but is so worth it in the end.  I used several fabric lines from Moda designers in this quilt by pulling fat quartersfrom my stash together. The result is this fantastically happy colored quilt.

(Block 13)
Week 4 and final assembly of your own Mama Gypsy should be happening - if not, no worries!  Keep going at your own pace. It has been fun to see the progress on so many darling quilt tops.
 

(Block 14)

(Block 15)

(Block 16)

When you are ready to piece the top - I like to piece 2 rows together, then piece the two halves together.  It is easier to maneuver that way.

My border for this quilt had...

It has been so much fun seeing all the progress on your quilts!  They are being shared in my Facebook group here and on Instagram using the #mamagypsyquiltqal - be sure to check them out.

You can still join my QAL - get your paper pattern here, or the PDF pattern here. 

Don't forget to be cutting and squaring up your bonus HST's so that you will have the blocks needed to put together a darling HST...

(Block 5)
I hope you are having a fun time putting Mama Gypsy together!  I am happy to announce that Dory Miller has won the $50 gift certificate to Green Fairy Quilts for this quilt along.  Thank you for joining my quilt along!

So, we are working on row 2 for this week.  Thank you for sharing your progress on Facebook and Instagram - your fabric choices and blocks are amazing!  Keep them coming!

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