Fool that I am, I have volunteered to coordinate the auction quilt for my daughters’ entire elementary school (almost 400 kids). So I thought it would be interesting to show our progress here on the blog. I wanted the quilt to be something that the kids could really get their hands on rather than something the other volunteers and I sew on our own, and with my children’s previous Montessori experience I immediately thought of embroidery.
So, again, fool that I am, I’m going for a stitched quilt as you can see in the digital sketch above. The school starts in the pre-primary years, so children from age three through sixth grade will be working on it (nine age groups). My idea is to make the stitching progressively more complex from the youngest to oldest kids — top to bottom. I think they will all be running stitches, maybe some back stitching and some simple cross stitching in the older grades. So far, I have only bought the fabric, but I plan to cut the fabric and mark out the designs with chalk, serge the edges since it will be handled a lot, and get all of the supplies ready to go for next week.
The colors will be slightly different from those shown above. I initially wanted to do it on a white background, but I think it has a more child-like quality with the bright colors. So, this could be a complete disaster, or it could turn out beautifully. You’ll have to wait and see!
Luckily, Deborah of Whipstitch Fabrics donated the fabric for us. Thank you, Deborah! If you live in Atlanta, you really should visit her shop on Marietta Street if you haven’t made it over there yet. And if you’re not local, you can still buy some wonderful fabric from her Etsy shop here. And more luck — Melody Miller, the fabulous designer of Kokka’s new line, Ruby Star Rising, has children at the same school so she’ll be helping with the project. And there are a handful of other wonderful people who have volunteered to help, so at least I’m not in this alone!
Noooo!!!! Don’t introduce me to another fabric vendor with beautiful beautiful fabrics! I can’t buy new fabric now!!
Wow! So interesting. I can’t wait to see how this comes together. Will each child get a square to hand stitch and then you’ll piece the like colors together? Such a great idea and how awesome of Whipstitch to donate the fabric. I have visited the shop and it’s very cute.
Amy — no small piecing! Each color will be one long strip of fabric. The strips will be sewn together and the top quilting will be done in the ditch along the seams in order to keep the embroidery as the textural focus.
while that is quite an undertaking, it sounds like a project that you have so well thought out…good luck with the process!! i’ll be very interested to see how it all comes out. your “virtual quilt” looks like it has just the right balance of color.
Love to see the progress on this project. What a wonderful school idea.
I’m very excited to see your idea in action. My son’s Montessori school auctions quilts but they are totally different from this concept. I am glad I follow your blog so I will get to see the process unfold.
It is going to be beautiful – really something made by children, all their loving little learning hands.
Please share their progress and all the steps that go into creating the quilt. I do think that we all would love to watch and learn along with them!
I love this idea. As a veteran of 3 “school” quilts, I thoroughly enjoyed helping the kids with their sewing. I have complete confidence in you, Ellen, I know this will be a grand success. Also, Whipstitch Fabrics is <> Erin and I truly enjoy our shopping trips together.
Beautiful idea!
I so enjoy your blog, thanks for sharing.
Impressive…can’t wait to see the final results…makes me want to do an embroidery quilt.