Rumi Quote Quilt

I got the inspiration for this quilt from Denyse Schmidt's Proverbial Quilt pattern.  Instead of making the quilt elements into geometric shapes or houses, trees, etc., the quilt design is a quote (or series of quotes), proverb, whatever words strike your fancy.

My friend, J, loves the writings by the poet Rumi, so I went through and found a quote that spoke to me, and that seemed like it would fit onto the size quilt I wanted to make.  The full quote is "Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of that which you really love."

 I didn't want to piece my letters together and quilt over them, so I made each letter an applique and quilted in the leading spacing.  I cut out the letters in freezer paper using my Silhouette, ironed the paper onto starched fabric and cut them out, including a seam allowance, as I needed them.

The quilted sections were just randomly sewn, I changed direction every few stitches and made sure to wander back and forth in the space.

It was definitely a lot of work.   I did all the applique and quilting by hand, which was fun, but next time I do this (and I certainly will), I think I'll cut out the letters on the Silhouette with fusible webbing on the fabric and quilt the outlines of the letters.

Happy birthday, J!