…otherwise known as my Fluffle quilt! I learnt the other week from Tracy’s blog that a collection of rabbits is called a fluffle, isn’t that such a gorgeous word, so this is now my fluffle quilt!!

Over the last few weeks I’ve been working on the deep applique borders stitching rabbits and flowers on, there’s still a lot of stitching to do there but in this post Christmas hiatus I decided to stitch the previous border which I had put on hold whilst I decided on the colours.

This border is made of elongated hexagons and triangles, it’s particularly effective when two main colours are used as it looks like a twisted rope. My initial hesitation was over the little triangles. Having seen a few on facebook (the advantage of being behind!!) I liked the effect when the triangles were the same fabric as the adjacent border, so all you see is the rope. Before I cut over eighty triangles I wanted to make sure I wasn’t leaving myself short for the main border, hence the wait!

I didn’t seem to have much fabric left, but luckily these are pretty small triangles. I bought the plastic template set from Sarah but I was very relieved to see I had exactly the right size in a die, so I could whizz them off with my die cutter. The hexagons were a bit more fiddly, but I put the radio on and set too and cut them all out one morning.

Originally I was thinking of using a selection of fabrics, about ten purple and ten green, I happened to read in the instructions though that if the colour was more limited it has a calming effect, as the borders either side are quite busy I decided to just use the plain shot green and a simple purple that I had used in previous borders, help to bring it all together.

I was a bit worried when I first saw this border as it did look complicated, but with Sarah’s instructions and video it all went together pretty easily. The triangles were stitched to either end of the hexagons to make a diamond. Having the corners cut off the triangles did make lining things up a lot easier.

As there are lots of seams on the bias pressing is done with caution, I used lots of Best Press to starch it which I think helped a lot. I’m having to extra careful stitching it on too as I realised I’d cut the hexagons with the grain on the wrong side, so my long edge of the border is all on the bias!

Now I’m open to suggestions for the next bit. I’ve stitched two rope borders on and I now have to decide which fabric to use for the corner stones. Most people are using a contrast, but I’m not so sure. I’ve laid out a few to see what you think, I tried lots of different ones, dark ones, light ones, purple, green, gold…these are the ones which I think could work;

Grey rabbits, this brings the rabbits in and it’s similar tone to the grey border,but I think it might be too close to the rabbits.

Bees, I do like this fabric but I’m finding it surprisingly difficult to place is this quilt. It’s a similar but lighter green to the rope, but the pattern brings out the olive greens of other fabrics.

Green, do I just use the green of the rope. I think this one is my favourite at the moment but it almost seems too obvious!! 

I’ve also realised in the photo I put the unstitched border upside down, so don’t worry, the border on the left with the purple triangles matching the purple border is the one that is stitched!! I’m looking forward to seeing what people think, if you want me to try something different just let me know 🙂