A friend and I just went to a 4-day retreat at Jittery Wings in Newberry, South Carolina, and it was terriffic!

I mentioned Jittery Wings and Mitzie Schafer last week as one of my favorite color resources. She has a unique approach and the purpose of attending her retreat was to learn her method.

This is the “first draft” of the quilt I am making from the retreat with Mitzie

Mitzie designs and makes quilts that are colorful, and much more complex than they appear. She has a specific method for choosing and arranging colors; you can read about that on her website and get her free workbook to explain further (click on the little box that says “get the workbook”.)

Here’s the palette I selected with Mitzie’s help. I don’t have the colors exactly in the right order, but you can see that they do flow.

Mitzie is a woman with many talents. She is a former marathon runner and potter, but she switched to quilting about 10 years ago due to medical issues. She quotes Tula Pink saying “It takes 10 years to become an overnight success” and it appears that Mitzie has accomplished just that. She has grown her pattern business while developing her own unique style of choosing and arranging colors, which she calls “color flow” and “controlled improv”. It looks to me like she has put in 10 years of hard work while keeping her “day job”, and I love the result!

Here are some of Mitzie’s quilts. This first is “All the Good”; my version is in last week’s post.

This is Mitzie’s pattern “All the Good”; photo courtesy of Jittery Wings.

Next is Mitzie’s quilt “Caper”. Believe it or not, that’s the pattern for my quilt at the top of this post. Color and block arrangement make a big difference!

Mitzie’s quilt “Caper” she arranged the colors in rainbow order for this version; photo courtesy of Jittery Wings

This third quilt is Hush Punk.

“Hush Punk” by Mitzie Schafer; photo courtesy of Jittery Wings

This final quilt is “Tambo Star”. The friend who went to the workshop with me chose this pattern, and we soon learned the arrangement of blocks is rather complex. Mitzie was there to help! Look closely for the stars.

“Tambo Star” by Mitzie Schafer; photo courtesy of Jittery Wings

As soon as I got home I joined the Jittery Wings Hive, primarily because Mitzie offers guided practice in her color and design principles. It also happens that the Hive includes courses on making her Hush Punk and Cosmic Sass patterns. I bought both of those at QuiltCon but haven’t made them yet, so stay tuned!

Have you made any of Mitzie’s patterns? Send pictures!