Tea Room Quilt--post 1

Sign--letters made from ultra suede scraps

"Major Pettigrew's Last Stand" written by Helen Simonson is the inspiration behind this quilt project. The first time that I read the book, I picked the fabrics and the pattern. The pattern is from JoJo's "All Things Through My Hands" blog post. You too can make your own variation!

It stayed on my FAL list for years. Last August, I volunteered to be the leader for the next book for our book club. I decided to re-read this book. Rereading gave me the opportunity to savor the details that Helen included in the story.

Cup ready for application

In the leader role, I contacted Helen and she consented to FaceTime the group during one meeting. We thoroughly enjoyed the insight she provided to the story as well as her humor.

In terms of the project for the book, I tackled the sign board first. I cut out the letters using ultra suede scraps from Martha's stash. Martha would have approved of me using her ultra suede scraps as letters for the sign board! My plan is to secure the letters during the quilting phase. I haven't used ultra suede before
so this is one of the "firsts" in this project!

Next, I stitched together the elements for the cup and then for the tea pot. In the story, the major is quite particular about his tea. I chose a cup that might have been one of his favorites. I had chosen a lighter brown fabric because I wanted the illusion of milk in his tea. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough contrast and my eye couldn't see the contents of the cup unless I was almost nose close to it! The tea is a richer blend now that it is a dark brown!

Tea pot beginnings

After constructing the cup, I selected fabrics for the tea pot. The design on the tea pot contained a bird. I was challenged to add elements to the tea pot so that it looked like it was part of a set. It was also challenging to select fabrics that had enough contrast for the background of the tea pot and the main background.

Auditioning the various elements

I decided repeating a couple fabrics in the tea pot would be a good way to make the pot and cup look like a set. I also cut a motif from the cup fabric to become the decorative top to the pot.

Next I pieced in a hanging post, auditioned placements of the elements and thought about border fabrics. The post needed to be positioned with some background fabric around at least three sides.

I cut off a section of the background and applied it to the top of the post. I liked the positioning better. Needle turning some of the elements, raw edge appliqué preparation for other elements and choosing the fabrics took about 10 hours.