A Winter's Garden Quilt { & Fabric GIVEAWAY! } : :

Oh, it feels so good to be back to blogging this morning and extra good to have my finished Winter's Garden Quilt to share today, along with a special Dear Stella Mercer Giveaway!



This gorgeous stack of fabrics became such a beautiful quilt, one of my new favorites for sure! The collection of classic prints in chevrons, florals, polka-dots, and solids inspired me to make something traditional and sweet, with a repetitive block design and sashing. A style of quilt that is very different from my regular craftship, but I'm so, SO happy with how it turned out!


 


For our photo shoot Kevin and I decided to visit the cabin, the very first home we shared together as a family! We've been wanting to bring one of my quilts here for picture taking for quite sometime, and this one just seems to fit so perfectly!

 
The heavily wooded land combined with how bright the sun was shining yesterday made everything a little shadowy, but still so pretty!



Keeping with the ultra soft and romantic feel of this quilt I sent it off to long arm quilter extraordinaire Melissa of Sew Shabby Quilting to quilt with beautiful roses, using her Simply Roses pattern!





For the backing I chose my very favorite Mercer print, Feathers in Indigo. It's such a gorgeous pattern!



For my binding I finished with a Stella Solid in Indigo. The quality of Dear Stella's solids is wonderful, they are so super soft! I love this shade of navy so much I had to use more to finish my newest Herringbone quilt that I'll be sharing a little later in the week!

As promised, now that I have finally finished, photographed, and shared my finished quilt, I have a gorgeous fat quarter bundle of Mercer ready to giveaway today!

Enter to win a FQ bundle of Mercer!

Here's how,   

1. Simply leave a comment here in this post! (one entry)
2. Follow Dear Stella Designs on Facebook or Instagram! Just let me know that you do by making a separate comment here to record that entry. (optional extra entry)
3. My followers get a third entry! Whether you follow me here, on Facebook, on Instagram, just let me know that you do by making a separate comment here to record that entry. (optional extra entry)
4. Help spread the word!! I know that many of you already do, so I thought it would be nice to add that as another way to enter! Whether by tweet, instagram, facebook, pin, blog, etc... (optional extra entry) 

That’s 4 possible entries! Enter now through Monday, March 31st. The winner will be chosen by Random and I will announce their name, at the bottom of this post, here on the blog!  
 

* Note * This giveaway is open to EVERYONE! If you're a "no reply" or anonymous commenter, please remember to include your email address in your comment!

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Thank you to all who entered the Giveaway!! From  1,798 entries, Mr. Random says the lucky winner is... 

Comment #1383 --   *   shayshap  * 

Congratulations, I'll be in touch shortly!   

Quilt & Giveaway Plans : :

I came down with a hard-hitting flu bug yesterday and it completely squashed all of my sewing plans for last night and for this morning, although I am beginning to feel a little better. There's nothing worse than feeling the satisfaction of being back on track only to be immediately derailed again, boo! But don't worry about me, I'll be back on schedule soon enough and so I thought I'd share my plans for when I am. They involve some pretty quilt finishes and giveaways to get excited about!

First up, my Winter's Garden quilt made using Dear Stella's Mercer collection arrived back from Sew Shabby Quilting this past weekend, with the most beautiful quilted roses!



I have a solid indigo planned for my binding which is tops on my to-do list. I think the solid should frame this quilt perfectly!



When I finish, photograph, and share my finished quilt I have a gorgeous fat quarter bundle of Mercer waiting to giveaway!



I've been sharing lots of posts on my Herringbone Dowry, True Colors, & Ribbons Quilt here and on my instagram. This one is also so close to being finished!



For the back and binding I pulled some favorite Anna Maria Horner prints from my stash! All the deep purples and bright aqua blues in her Dowry collection made me reach for more. I can't wait to finish this one too!



For when I do I'll have another amazing giveaway to share for a Design Roll of each Dowry & True Colors collections and the entire Dowry ribbons collection!



Stay tuned...  and stay healthy!  ♥  Maureen

Mercer ♥ : :

In addition to the Fabric Giveaway Fridays I organize with my wonderful sponsors to share at the end of each week, this year I'm teaming up with many of our favorite fabric manufacturing companies to present, highlight, & offer special giveaways for the new collections not yet or newly released to this beautiful fabric world of ours! This week, I'm very excited to showcase & possibly introduce to you for the first time, Mercer by Dear Stella!



This collection includes so many of my favorite classic prints! Chevrons, one simple & strong in crisp navy and one made by soft by the fine lines that create the pattern in pale peachy & grey tones, three stunning florals each with a unique pattern and scale in a dreamy palette of smoke, indigo, cream and melon, a whimsical feather print, quite possibly my most favorite among the group, and basic yet modern polka-dots and solids that fuse each print together to form a lovely and cohesive collection!





When these fabrics arrived I decided on making a quilt right away! My process for designing this quilt and for all of my projects, usually begins with me fanning out the fabrics, sometimes separating them into color-stories, and then I simply begin sketching out my idea onto paper.  Almost always it takes just one sketch for me to settle on an idea to use as my guide. For these I was inspired to make something traditional and sweet, with a repetitive block design and sashing!





I'm sixteen blocks in and am so happy with how it's coming together! I'm still a bit undecided on my sashing, but if today goes well, I'll have a finished quilt top to show you all very soon!


 
You can find this gorgeous Dear Stella Mercer fabric collection available at both Pink Castle Fabrics here and the Fat Quarter Shop here! Be sure to visit Dear Stella Designs, to follow them on Facebook or Instagram, and to keep an eye out for a Mercer fabric giveaway right here just as soon as I finish up my quilt!

You can see a few more pretty quilt ideas for this collection right here! How about you, what would you make with Mercer?

♥  Maureen