Big Ocean Sew Along Week 1: Color Palettes, Creativity, and a Zoom Call!

Welcome to the official start of the Big Ocean Sew Along! I am so excited to create with you all this summer. By now, you have probably seen my fabric prep posts about pulling your color palette and checking the value breakdown of your pull so you have the best fabric palette to start with and build on. Join us tonight for the Zoom kickoff! We’ll meet on Zoom at 4pm PST to talk about our planned color palettes. Bring your fabrics to share if you have them! I look forward to working with you all to help troubleshoot any color palette issues you may be having so we can all get ready to cut into our fabrics next week! If you want to join us on Zoom but you don’t have the link, sign up for the Sew Along here. I will send out the link to all Sew Along newsletter subscribers today, shortly before the Zoom call. 

As we head into our sew along, with our color palettes in hand, I want to talk about my approach to creativity, and how I apply it to my quilting. I approach my quilts knowing that my color palettes will change as I go. If I’m trying a new-to-me technique or composition, I know it’s possible it may go nowhere. Embracing change and redirection allows me to be totally creative with my work. I can play and try things that are stuck in my head and just go for it. 

During the sew along, I will be working on a quilt along with all of you. I’m starting with a color focus that isn’t typical for me: purple. I’ll be making a baby quilt for my niece, whose favorite color is purple. The palette I’m building for this quilt is a starting point. I know that it will change as I go. Maybe I’ll add more hues of a certain color, or maybe I’ll pull some out. If you find a color that adds something special to your color palette, use some restraint. It can be tempting to add more shades of that color, but the full moon is special because it comes once a month, and a special color in a palette is the same! Sometimes just one or two shades of a color add that special something your palette needed.   

Be sure to bring your color palette with you to our Zoom call today so we can inspire each other and help each other work out any spots we’re stuck on. If you want me to take you step by step through the design process of making your Big Ocean quilt, with everything that you’ll find in the sew along content and much more, you can find all that in my Big Ocean on demand course.