Applique Floral Top

I have been dabbling a bit with Lori Holt’s blog and checking out some books that I brought back from the store a year or more ago now.

I have wanted to start making some of her quilts. I want to expand my horizons and styles and not just scrappy quilts like I’ve been doing. I decided I needed to start somewhere. And somewhere easy. I mean, super easy.

I had seen Jenny Doan make something similar years ago - maybe it was an orange peel block. I can’t find the video for this quilt with the flower. Maybe I’m remembering wrong. Doesn’t matter. At that time had no desire to make anything like this.

But sometimes things change over time and this is one of them.

I had seen Lori’s quilt and really liked it. I thought it seemed simple enough for even a newbie applique person like me.

So, I decided to start by trying.

I got Rachael to get some of Lori’s shape templates for me, and I did use the petal for this. I don’t think I had the circle for the middle in any of the templates I had so I just used a jar lid that was about 3” diameter. I am sure you could freehand draw a petal and use a paper template or cardboard, but I got the plastic ones. :) If you are in Florida, you can go into the store and check what she has. I’m encouraging her to expand the store with her stuff, especially as I begin to do more of Lori’s patterns and use her fabrics.

I used the method that both Jenny and Lori talk about and that is using interfacing to sew to the original piece of fabric and then turning it so you don’t end up with any raw edges. I really preferred the look of this to the raw edge applique - even when I zigzag or buttonhole stitch the edges. This way, at least according to Lori Holt, you zigzag the pieces down with matching or coordinating thread and there are no exposed raw edges.

I wanted to make this using some of her fabrics or at least as much as I could.

This is what I ended up making. And yes, I really do like it! It wasn’t difficult but did take a bit of time to do the fussy part of it - the marking the interfacing, the turning and trimming the petals, and then the setting up of the blocks. This applique stuff is definitely a new experience for me. I’ve not done much applique to this point. But I hope to begin to expand my horizons in this department.

I used various prints form Lori Holt fabrics - whatever I was able to bring over at the time. It was fun. I’m sure maybe even more impressive with a certain line of fabric, but that’s not how I work, nor will I be able to do things with such restrictions. I just don’t have the fabrics over here to be able to do that. I have added fabrics as needed for the backgrounds as I didn’t bring enough back to Poland so I have supplemented some of my lights - mostly text fabrics.

So, if you want to make such a quilt, just follow the video I put above and go for it! I’m sure even if you don’t have a petal template, you can find a freebie somewhere.

If you are looking for Lori Holt fabrics we do have a few of them. Check them out here.

Of course, this is in Florida - not here in Poland. I’m really kicking myself that I didn’t bring even more than I did. But I’ll use up what I have and add from my rather extensive stash. :) You’ll see.

Thanks so much for coming along with me on this journey!

Have a great day wherever you are reading this.

Becky Petersen3 Comments