Tu-Na Quilts: All Aboard. Fasten Your Seatbelts. We’re Taking Off for…

Paris! Oui, oui, s’il vous plaît. Mes chers amis quilty, un voyage au beau Paris serait tellement merveilleux.*

I apologize for the blurriness. I was in a hurry as we were leaving to head north and remembered to grab a couple of pics. My husband took these pics and we had them made into prints. They are displayed in our guest room.

 

It was always a dream of mine to visit Paris. Three years ago, it became a reality. I thought you might like to go too.

I have a number of fun and funny posts planned for this month so I hope you’ll check back here often so you won’t be left behind.

My inspiration for my quilt block comes from several sources. I’ll share one now and another on another post. Early this winter my mom and I were shopping for fabric (well, we were just looking) and then I spied this.

It would be perfect for a quilt in our guest room in Arizona. So I bought all that they had which was about 2 1/2 yards because…why not? I think it would be perfect for the sashing.

“What kind of quilt are you going to make?” asked my husband (who is also lovingly refered to as Tu-Na Helper).

Since Velda had already taken my bird idea, I had to come up with another plan. So I looked closer at that fabric and spied this cute little poodle.

Do you see that cute little poodle? The background is bright white although it looks bluish here.

 

I don’t have a dog but if I ever did it just might be a poodle, a French Poodle. A French poodle block would be perfect to go with my Paris themed guest room.

 

I found this wonderful addition to our guest room at a thrift shop. In fact, the headboard, each of the two identical lamps, side tables, and the mirror with hooks as shown in the picture above were all found at different thrift shops.

 

I thought a French poodle quilt would add some whimsy and warmth to our guest room. So that’s going to be our block that I invite you to make for me.

Isn’t she adorable? Although, I think I’ll make it again and use the dots for the body and the swirls for the furry accents.

 

Pattern: You can find the tutorial and pattern for this adorable poodle here on The Objects of Design blog. You’ll be making the right facing poodle. I am also in Stash Bee Hive 9 and they will be making left facing poodles for me later in the year. 

Fabric selection: You will only be using 4 different fabrics (one for the background, one for the poodle body, one for the furry accent parts, and a solid black for the eye and nose). 

Background possibilities (referred to as White in the pattern tutorial): Please choose one fabric (not scrappy).

• white on white
• white with black
• white with dark gray
• black on black
• black with white

Poodle Body (referred to as Light fabric in the pattern tutorial): Your poodle should be the opposite color of your background. Here again, choose one fabric–not scrappy. Example: If you select a black background, then choose a white fabric for the body.

Body possibilities:

• white on white
• white with black
• white with dark gray
• black on black
• black with white
• white or black with pink or wine or burgundy but no other color except gold or silver (I don’t have any samples but thought I’d throw it out there just in case someone has something like that as I think it would make a great poodle body or furry accent.

 

American Made Brand Fabrics has a wine color (AMB 47 Light wine) that looks like it matches nicely (but then I am just looking at it online and not in person). I included it here to give you a color sample.

Furry Accent (referred to as Dark fabric in the pattern tutorial): Please select a complimentary fabric to your body selection. If using a white fabric, find one that is also white but has lots of contrast that will make it stand out or read as a darker version of your color choice.

Nose tip and eye: Solid black

My quilt will not be all black and white. The cornerstones will be pinks and wines and burgundy. There might be a pink or burgundy flange binding too.

Here’s some pinks and wines with one burgundy/gold that I have that I thought would make nice cornerstones. What do you think?

 

I am using the picture on the wall in that guest room for inspiration.

If you have a 4.5″ square of pink, pink/white,  white/pink, wine, or burgundy fabric that you’d like to include in the cornerstones, I would really appreciate it.  I would also love to receive a 1.5″ square of each of the fabrics (except the solid black) that you use in this block so I could include it in my postage stamp quilt.

Hints: I dabble in small pieces and there are a fair amount of small pieces in this pattern. To make things a bit easier for you, I made up some labels in the pdf below. Just print, cut them out, and lay them on the anatomical parts so you don’t get confused. Believe me, without labels, when you come back to your sewing machine after your lunch break, you won’t know the ear from the rear.

Clover clips help keep those labels in place

My next hint is to use a scant 1/4″ seam. Measure and trim as needed. The block will be 14″ unfinished.

Hint number three pertains to pressing seams. The block will be sashed so I won’t have to worry about nesting seams. However, I prefer the seams in the block to be pressed to the side, usually to the dark side (I just finished watching episode 1 of Star Wars so I couldn’t resist putting that in). But there will be times that doing so will make for a very bulky seam so you will need to watch for that and press in the direction that makes the most sense so as to avoid that bulk.

Lastly, read the tutorial through before starting. Note the corrections as I have listed them below. There are a lot of steps. But the poodle comes to life quite quickly once all the pieces are cut and prepped. I’ve prepared a cutting check-off list for you as I found that to be helpful for me and have included it in the pdf below.

Pattern corrections (these will make more sense if you locate the section in the tutorial and note it): 

Cutting Dark fabric: Cut one 2.75 by 4.25 rectangle rather than the 2.75 by 4.75

The caption of the picture that shows the squares for flipping the corners for the dark (furry accent parts) should read: For ear: (last line of caption should say) “on upper (not lower) left corner.”

When making the Under belly, the square should be a 2.75″ light (body) not 2 inch as listed.

When sewing the Lower left middle: sew 1.25 by 2 inch light (body) strip to shortest side.

Extras: One 1.25 by 2.75 in background rectangle with light 1.25 flip in lower left.

Here’s the pdf label and cutting chart for your convenience.

Right facing poodle cutting checklist and labels

Do check back again as we explore Paris together. I will show you pics of things I saw, tell you funny stories of things that happened to me (“Oh, why do things happen to me?”  Tu-Na laments as she touches the back of her hand to her forehead.), present more poodles as I sew them, and entertain you while you sew for me.

*yes, yes, please. My dear quilty friends, a trip to beautiful Paris would be so marvelous. (ok. This was from Google translate. My French vocabulary consists of oui oui and merci).

What I Learned Today:

1. What a muzzle is. I am not a dog person and had no idea so I had to look it up.
2. If it can go wrong, it will.
3. I miss being in Paris.
4. How to change my address in our address spreadsheet.
5. There is hope for me yet (regarding computer understanding).

Question: Have you been to Paris or anywhere in France?

Merci beaucoup. Au Revoir

Karen