Kristin VanKampen Quilting

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Tulip Wall Hanging

Here in West Michigan, tulips are a serious deal. We live just about 30 minutes from Holland, Michigan, a city that holds an annual Tulip Time Festival that draws people from all over the world. Tulips fill all of downtown and it’s quite magical. There wasn’t much celebrating for Tulip Time this year due to Covid, so I thought I’d bring some tulip joy myself!

This gorgeous pattern by Shabby Fabrics was so much fun to make! It is all raw edge appliqué and finished with free motion quilting. I love how whimsical and joyful it is!

Isn’t it just so much fun? This piece found its way to my parents’ house where their yellow walls complement the it perfectly.

Colorful Caddy

Everyone needs a little more organization in their lives, right? This beautiful caddy is perfect for carrying around a few supplies, keeping your car essentials organized, or storing craft or office supplies. This pattern from byannie.com is the perfect size and is full of pockets to hold anything you need.

This piece uses the same fabric by EttaVee (Jessi Raulet) that I am absolutely in love with. The lining and binding are done in a classic navy. On one of the side pockets I used a turquoise zipper to add a pop of new color.

Five outer slip pockets provide lots of spots to store items, and a zippered pocket on one end keeps important items secure.

Expanding dividers on the inside organize all kinds of supplies or can collapse flat against the interior for more space.

I can think of at least four places in my life that I would like to have a caddy like this!

Bright Side Mojave Quilt

After all the quilts I’ve made, I’ve yet to make one that I decided to keep. It is just so much fun to give them away! When I saw this quilt pattern I knew it was our style. I made this quilt this summer as a gift for my husband (and myself). It has found a home at the end of our bed and we love it.

The pattern is called Bright Side by the quilt designer Then Came June. She’s one of my favorites I follow on Instagram and it was fun to work up one of her patterns. It came together really quickly which was so satisfying.

For the backing I went with a gray and cream striped sheet I found at Target. I’m loving using 100% cotton sheets as backing because you don’t have to have any seams to get a cut of fabric large enough. Sheets are also so soft and usually come in all over patterns that work great with a variety of quilt tops.

Hands down my favorite part of this quilt is the scrappy binding. This was my first time doing a scrappy binding and I’m obsessed with it. I think it adds so much personality!

Bloom Quilt (Take 2)

When we found out we were pregnant with our second daughter, I knew then that I wanted to make her a matching Bloom quilt to her sister. I loved making Lori Holt’s pattern and loved the idea of the two girls having similar quilts to one another. Someday if they share a room together, wouldn’t it look so cute to see these quilts on their beds?

You can see my oldest’s Bloom quilt here. For this version I switched up the color palette, focusing on more blues, purples and pinks. The core line of fabric that I worked from is called One Room Schoolhouse designed by Brenda Ratliff.

For this quilt I used Lori Holt’s appliqué method which I absolutely love. Each flower shape is backed with sew-in interfacing and then turned so that all of the edges are finished before stitching down. I love that no matter how hard my girls are on these quilts, the flowers won’t show signs of wear.

For the quilting, I again chose straight line quilting on all sashing and a close meander quilting within the flower blocks. I also stitched around each flower center to help it “pop” off the background. I love how much texture it achieved!

Both of my girls love their quilts and love to talk about which flowers are their favorites. It brings me so much joy to see them use them!

EttaVee Fabric Zip Bag

I have been a huge fan of the artist Jessi Raulet after finding her on her EttaVee Instagram. I’m obsessed with her vivid colors and movement and basically want everything she paints. When I found out she had made a line of fabric, I knew I wanted to use some to make handmade bags.

I was able to score some of this gorgeous print from a quilt shop online and used it to create my new sewing machine cover. I had just enough quilted fabric left over to make this Easy Does It pattern from byannie.com.

I absolutely love how the contrasting zipper looks with the fabric. I shopped my stash for the light purple accent fabric which is bright enough that I think Jessi would approve. 😀

Stars and Stripes Quilt

A good friend and mentor of mine absolutely loves all things Americana. Her summer cottage is decorated with lots of reds, whites and blues and the Fourth of July is her favorite holiday. I knew she would love this Stars and Stripes design by Thimble Blossoms!

The fabrics are a mix of Bonnie and Camille reds, blues and aqua. I’m always a big fan of using striped fabrics for the binding and I love how this red and white fabric turned out!

For the backing fabric I found this beautiful 100% cotton sheet that coordinated with of the Bonnie and Camille fabrics and also added so much softness. For quilting I chose simple straight line quilting across the flags.

This quilt reminds me of celebrating the Fourth of July in my hometown!

Sewing Machine Cover

One of my favorite artists right now is Jessi Raulet who I found on her EttaVee Instagram. When I discovered she had made a line of fabric, I knew I wanted to use some to make a cover for my sewing machine. When Covid hit we realized we would rarely be having extra people in our home for dinner. Knowing that, I decided to move my sewing machine into our dining room. It has allowed me so much more time to sew while still caring for our kids. I loved having it there but didn’t love the cluttered look of my machine and supplies.

When I saw byannie.com released their Under Cover pattern I knew that could be what I needed to help curb the clutter in my dining/sewing room. Enter this gorgeous EttaVee fabric. It honestly feels more like a piece of art to me. It makes me smile every time I look at it!

As always, Annie’s bag patterns are amazing to follow. She helped me customize the dimensions to fit my Juki TL2010-Q including a sleeve in the back to slide my extension table in.

It has a big front pocket to hold patterns and my manual and side pockets which are perfect for my presser foot when I travel. The top opens with magnetic closures to allow me to access the carrying handle with the cover on.

I absolutely love it and am so excited to have this piece in my dining room!

Starlight Sampler Quilt

One of the beautiful joys in the midst of all of the hardships of 2020 was finding lots of new time for finishing works in progress that had been sitting in my sewing cabinet. I started this gorgeous star quilt in January of 2017 and was able to finish it in June of 2020.

The pattern is Starlight Sampler by Amy Gibson. I bought the pattern and fabric on a whim through Craftsy. It finished 96” x 96” which was the biggest quilt I’d quilted to date. It was so large that I needed to glue baste it on my driveway!

I was able to gift this quilt to a dear friend of mine who uses it in her bedroom. It reminded me so much of her favorite colors to decorate with at Christmastime that, as I was working on it, I just couldn’t stop thinking about how perfect it would be for her.

This project was my first time doing foundation paper piecing, which Amy Gibson made so easy in her free class through Craftsy. I absolutely love how perfect your star points can be with that method!

This was also one of my first projects to receive a custom tag. I printed those on my home printer using special fabric.

This pattern is full of so many unique and creative blocks that I think will find their way into more projects I make in the future!

Vintage Tablecloth Quilt

This quilt was such an honor to get to work on. It was made from vintage tablecloths that my sister received that had once belonged to our grandparents. She came to me hoping I could turn them into a special keepsake. I absolutely love how they came together in this quilt!

Many of the tablecloths had stains on them so we decided to turn them into a pieced quilt, that could use the parts of the fabric that were in good condition. Each block finishes at 8″ square and are set on a diagonal.

The backing and binding fabric are from the Wiltshire Shadow Collection by Riley Blake Designs in cornflower blue. This was such gorgeous fabric that we felt complemented the colors but also enhanced the vintage design.

I chose simple straight line quilting on the diagonal for this piece. I’m absolutely thrilled with how it turned out!

This makes me want to think of other creative ways to use fabric or clothing to commemorate someone I love. My grandmother would have been so thrilled to see these tablecloths find new life in a quilt. Although I’m sure she would have cringed at the thought of me cutting into them!!

Hexi Framed Quilt

For a long time I’ve loved making patterns by Emily Dennis of Quilty Love. I’d been wanting to make a Hexi Framed quilt and finally found the right mix of fabrics to inspire me!

I absolutely love the mix of fun and funky fabrics. Most are Art Gallery fabrics from a variety of designers. Emily’s pattern uses half hexagons, which means no “y” seams. It still took a really long time to piece the top but was much easier than other methods of making hexagons.

This was another Covid quarantine finish for me and I was able to gift it to a dear friend of mine. Although I couldn’t give her an actual hug at that point, it felt like the next best thing!