Applique Hearts

So I saw a little snippet of a picture on an ad in a quilt magazine (wow, LOTS of prepositional phrases there) of a quilt kind of like this. Now, I am still on a fabric fast (although, thanks to Jill I was able to break that fast with no injury to my bank account), so for this quilt I just dug into my stash. I had some Shangri-La (by Moda) and some Anticipation (old Sandy Gervais for Moda) that matched perfectly. I also used a piece of pale pink flannel that I had left over from making somebody pajamas a number of Christmases ago and a couple of red fat quarters from Joann's. Don't know who made them. Probably going to regret that because of the fading factor, but I always remember that in hindsight. The squares are 15 1/2 inches cut. I just freehanded the heart on a piece of 12x12 chipboard that was the front cover to a paper pack. I did the large one, and then cut the smaller one out of the middle of the larger one, so I only had to use one template for both. I just machine appliqued them -- little zigzag. There are actually 12 squares altogether, so 3x4, and then I will put sashing in between and a couple of borders to make it into a throw-size quilt. I'll give finished dimensions when it's . . . well, finished. This is a fast, simple quilt. I typically do such complex quilts that they never get done (see my lengthy current projects list), so I'm trying to change that.

Now, on this quilt I did trim the hearts out of the backs of the large hearts and used some of them to cut out the smaller hearts. The rest of the small hearts that I didn't do on the front I am saving to applique onto the back of the quilt. It just seemed like such a lot of fabric (and fabric that I LOVE, too!) to waste in layering. I know you're supposed to trim out the back on applique, but I'm so random with when I do and don't. This time I did.

This is my favorite one, I think. Enough contrast, but mostly subtle blending. I just love it!