Cultivate Blog Tour

I was excited when Bonnie Christine asked if I would like to join the blog tour for her latest fabric line Cultivate.  If you recall, I participated in her Sweet as Honey blog tour last year with my Starflower wall hanging quilt.  I LOVED that fabric line and am not at all disappointed in Cultivate :) Bonnie says cultivate was inspired by her love for gardening.  "It’s as pure and simple as digging in the dirt!  Growing vegetables and cutting fresh flowers from the garden is one of my most favorite pleasures in life.  There’s something so special about preparing a meal with food you’ve grown yourself, and arranging a bouquet of flowers fresh from the yard.  Don’t you think?  It’s about the romance of reaping the harvest through and through.  It’s filled with floral motifs, garden patches, roots and seeds."

The colors in this line scream fall to me, and I love the colors of fall.  For my project, I used only one of the prints from the Cultivate line, Plotted Farm in Moss.  My first thought was to make a cute gardener's apron, but quickly found that Bonnie already had that idea and created one herself.  So, I found a perfectly suited verse from Psalms to embroider instead.

He makes the grass grow for the cattle, and plants for people to cultivate bringing forth food from the earth.  Psalm 104:14

I started by creating the text image of the verse and then printing it on Pellon's Stick and Washaway embroidery stabilizer.  It was the first time for me to use this product and it worked wonderfully.  I really didn't feel like tracing all of those letters onto the fabric and happened upon this...MUCH faster!  And I chose this beautiful coppery brown metallic embroidery floss to use (DMS E898).

I'm still working on my embroidery skills and this metallic thread wasn't the easiest to work with (or thread through a needle!!), but it's not too bad.

And you can really see the metallic floss shimmer in the morning sun :)

Details for the entire blog tour (and a slew of gorgeous creations) are below and also on Bonnie's blog here.

Monday August 3rd – Sarah Sharp | No Hats Quilts Tuesday August 4th – Caroline Hulse | Sew Caroline Wednesday August 5th – Bonnie Christine  AND Maxie Makes  Thursday August 6th – Caitlin Topham | Salty Oat Friday August 7th – Sandi Sawa Hazlewood | Crafty Planner Monday August 10th – Danielle Golinski | Food Family Story Tuesday August 11th – Sharon Holland | Sharon Holland Designs Wednesday August 12th – Audrey | Skirt Fixation Thursday August 13th – Sarah Overton | My Crowded Nest Friday August 14th – Bonnie Ferguson | Fish Stick Designs Monday August 17th – Annie McGee | Scavenger Annie Tuesday August 18th – Jenn Thurston | Quilted Thimble Cottage Wednesday August 19th – Ryan Horton  The Blooming Thread (coming soon) Thursday August 20th – Teresa Behr | Dandelion Drift Friday August 21st – Mary Kolb | Mary Lake Pulaski Monday August 24th – Amanda Castor (me!) | Material Girl Quilts Tuesday August 25th – Rachael Mckeeman | The Floral Suitcase Wednesday August 26th – Trudi Wood Thursday August 27th – Maria Hennlein | Villa Stoff Friday August 28th – Shayla Wolf  | Sassafras Lane Monday August 31st – Maureen Cracknell Handmade Tuesday September 1st – April San Pedro | I am Artisan Wednesday September 2nd – Final Recap

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Amanda