Tula Nova — Behind the Seams

• February 19, 2019
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In what feels like forever ago my Mom gifted me a quilt class or retreat of my choice for my birthday in 2017. A few months later I heard that Tula Pink would be teaching at Quiltique. I immediately called Quiltique and added my name to the waitlist. A few weeks later they called back and said I was in! We booked our flights (my mom came with me) and eagerly awaited the day!!

I purchased the kit for Tula Nova from Quiltique as looking at the pattern I knew picking fabrics for all of those pieces would be intimidating. The class was an all-day class and it went by fast! By the end of the day, we had some of the center block completed.

Tula is a sweetheart and I would not think twice about taking another class with her! Definitely worth the flight to Vegas!

I finished that center block on the flight home that night! And the rest of the weekend was spent cutting and basting all of the other pieces in the quilt!

Then it was time to get to work!

I split the quilt up into “rounds” I would work on all of the “blocks” for each round and then attach them all at the same time to the quilt. I worked on my blocks EVERYWHERE, work (on lunch), watching tv at night, AAA waiting to renew my license, waiting to get my oil changed, the dentist, on quite a few flights and even to Disneyland (wait times fly by if you are sewing).

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Part of what I LOVED about the Tula Nova is how fast it seemed to grow as you added blocks! It quickly went from a small block to feeling like a quilt.

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And just like that, the top was finished!

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I decided that I wanted to quilt it myself so after attending Road to California and purchasing a set of quilting rulers I used Free Motion Quilting to custom quilt my Tula Nova.

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🥁🥁🥁 DRUM ROLL PLEASE 🥁🥁🥁

Here are a few closeup shots of different parts of the quilt:

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At some point in making all of the blocks for the quilt, I came up with the idea to make an additional block for the label to tie the label into the rest of the quilt. I also knew in addition to the typical information for a label I wanted to include the states (and Disneyland) that I had worked on the quilt in! So those states went in the points around the main Pentagon.

4/26/19 — Mom and I went out to Ventura today to attend Tula Pink’s Truck show at Super Buzzy. After her talk Tula was nice enough to stick around and sign things and I was able to get my label signed!!

7/21/19 — I have an exciting update! I submitted my Tula Nova to the 2019 Orange County Fair. I finally got a chance to visit the fair this weekend and I found out I won First Place in my class (Quilting Other Than Bed Quilts 02 — Machine-Quilted, Wall Hanging, Patchwork or Pieced) !! Here is a picture of my quilt at the fair!