Little Houses

I was asked last year to take part in a traveling quilt bee with some pretty talented ladies. Amber (@simplelovequilts) chose a house theme for her quilt.  She wanted scrappy houses with fussy cut scenes and lots of cool colors on a low volume background.  I loved this assignment. Each member of the traveling quilt bee starts by sending one block to the next member on the list. The second person adds her own touch to the quilt and sends it on to the next person in the bee, and so on and so on. At the end, each person will get a completed quilt top. Amber sent me a six inch house and tree tops to start her quilt.



I thought a lot (probably too much!) about what I would add to this house. I was more nervous than I thought I would be - what if I completely missed Amber's vision!? After more thinking, I put my fears aside and jumped in. This house block has long been one of my favorite house blocks and I decided to use this as my inspiration. I used Quiet Play's Little Houses paper piecing pattern to make eight, tiny houses.


This was my first time doing paper piecing and I found I really enjoyed it! Cutting accurately is not my favorite part of quilting. Paper piecing takes out that step and results in accurate seams, but you will need to get over the extra fabric waste involved.

 

I centered my houses around a Heather Ross, paper-pieced heart.



At this point I could have stopped. But on the very day I meant to ship the house blocks on to the next bee member, I was inspired to create another scene incorporating the purple house Amber originally sent. Wouldn't it look great in a valley with an improv sky and a tiny, patchwork sun shining down upon it? I had to get this idea into fabric form immediately.



As a final touch, I added a sawtooth star for a later bee member to incorporate into a starry sky scene (as requested by Amber).

 

I am so pleased with how this turned out and excited to see how the other bee members will add to it. I loved this theme and want to make my own scrappy house quilt now. Just another quilt idea to add to the bucket list!