I can't wait for the tulips to start appearing in the garden. Quite literally: I've been buying bunches from the supermarket already - honestly, I just can't walk past them - as they last so well in a vase I can enjoy them for a good week.
Buuut if I wanted them to last even longer I could immortalise them in fabric. I already have once or twice, but I realised that with a few simple tweaks I could use my Daylilies quilt pattern to make a third. And Tulips are members of the Lily family after all.
My mock-up of a tulip-strewn variation of my Daylilies pattern
Daylilies is a wonderfully beginner-friendly pattern and the blocks are made in sets of four so before you know it you have a bunch of them (see what I did there?!). In my original Christmas version the flowers are all the same, but I've always wanted to make a scrappy version.
If you'd like to do the same you will need to make the following alterations to the Daylilies pattern. As luck would have it, Daylilies is my April PDF pattern of the month and to celebrate the Easter weekend I've discounted it already. If you prefer a paper pattern you can find that here.
MATERIALS
9 2½" x WOF strips of various prints for the tulips
9 pairs of 2½" x WOF strips of green prints for the leaves
3¼ yds of background fabric (Makower Linen Texture in Delft)
4 yds fabric for backing
70” x 70” Cotton Batting
½ yd of binding fabric
OMIT STEP 1
STEP 2
From the each of the tulip print 2½” x WOF strips, cut 2 2½” x 9” pieces and 2 2½” x 5” pieces.
STEP 3
From the each pair of green print 2½” x WOF strips, cut 2 2½” x 17” pieces and 2 2½” x 13” pieces.
STEP 4
In addition to the pieces listed, cut 2 5" x WOF strips and subcut 9 5" squares.
STEPS 6
Piece the blocks as described, substituting a 5" background square in place of the contrast A square and 2½” x 5” tulip print pieces in place of the contrast B pieces.
STEP 7.
Substitute 2½” x 9” tulip pieces in place of the contrast B pieces.
Complete STEPS 8 - 19 as described in the pattern.
I'm using my favourite Makower Linen Texture as my background - in a lovely new-to-me shade of Delft blue - which I'm combining with some fun 1930s-style conversational prints that I've been hoarding for far too long along with the very last of a favouriute Cath Kidston paisley from my stash.
Here are my blocks so far...
And this is how they look together...
They even brought the sun out in the studio...
I hope you'll be treating yourself to a bunch of patchwork tulips over the long weekend, you can whip them up in no time and they have an infinite vase-life. And what's more you really do deserve them.
Happy Easter,
Nicola xx