April is my birth month, so this birthday-looking image caught my eye. I love the pastel tones, so it was fun to play around with them, especially after the jewel tones of last month.
Image courtesy of sarahreneaclark.com
These colours are also reminiscent of Easter decorations, and since Easter in April this year, this fits as well.
Fabric swatches for April 2026
Having colours on the screen as inspiration is one thing, but as quilters we need to be able to find them in fabric collections as well. I'm using the QuiltySolid app to put together fabric bundles of some common solids brands.
- Robert Kaufman Kona Cotton: Baby Blue, Meringue, Desert Green, Pearl Pink, Med. Pink
- Northcott Colorworks: Reflection, Popcorn, Vellum, Innocence, Rose Petal
- Moda Bella Solids: Summer Sky, Baby Yellow, Home Town Sky, Baby Pink, Camellia
- Andover Fabrics Century Solids: Water, Almond, Oyster, Slipper, Pink Lemonade
- Art Gallery Pure Solids: Tranquil Waters, Chamomile, Icy Mint, Cotton Candy, Silk Ribbon
- HEX codes, to look up other brands: #b9eaf1, #fff4be, #d6e7df, #f9d9de, #f4b4bd
Always check these in person, though. The app gives the closest colours by hue, saturation, and value, to the HEX code entered, but they may not look quite right together in person. Substituting a different shade for one of the fabrics might work better.
Mockups of real quilt patterns
I'm trying to make an effort to not include the same patterns here all the time. Although I love my favourites, and certain patterns work better with certain colour schemes, I do have over 50 patterns in my catalogue to play with, so I branched out a little into FPP blocks as well.
First up is
Be Mine, which was just calling to me with that colour scheme. Technically, I designed that pattern originally as a Valentine's quilt, but as soon as I made it I kept thinking about it as a baby quilt, so pastel colours always draw me to that one. Setting them against the dark blue background really makes them pop.
Second is a good old favourite that I just can't skip, and that's
Bar Code. I love the versatility of that pattern, how it changes the tone and look depending on the colour scheme. For this one I always have to add an extra colour, since my inspiration images tend to have 5 colours but this quilt needs 6 for the bars. This makes it fun to see how the overall look changes depending on which colour I add.
On the first one here I added an extra pink...
... and in the second one I added another blue.
Facets is a fun pattern I like playing with, but it can sometimes be tricky with mockups depending on the colour scheme. This pastel one works perfectly, though. Instead of just using the 5 fabrics, I used 3 shades of each colour from the inspiration picture. So there are 3 pale yellows, 3 pale blues, 3 minty greens, 3 pale pinks, and 3 darker pinks. And all of it on a white background again.
And lastly,
Connections is a block pattern I don't often play with, but that is a really fun one. I originally designed it as part of Quilt Block Mania and I can't quite remember the prompt, but I thought of subway maps when I made it. And I wanted to make sure the blocks would connect to each other if multiples were put together in a quilt, to make a giant subway. The colours don't all match up when adding them together, but the lines still do, and you can pick whether you want the red/pink lines to form circles in the corners, or the yellow :-) Just turn the blocks a certain way.
Here's the single block:
This is a mini made of 4 blocks:
And here's a throw quilt with 16 blocks:
What do you think? Are you going to try out this colour scheme in a future quilt?
In your weekly email, you wondered how to hang a small quilt. I always put triangle corners on the back. All four corners if it’s not directional. Then I use a strip of wood or dial rod and even a sturdy straw the width of the quilt to hang on a command strip hook. I love small wall quilts. I’d love to send you a photo of my three sisters and I carrying our small quilts at the 2026 AQS Paducah Show parade.