A Lovely Year of Finishes - August 2015

Whew, I made it!  I am linking up with Sew BitterSweet Designs declaring my finish for August.  I really didn't realize how many little pieces were in this quilt until I took it apart and put it back together!!  The small squares started out at 2", but after I sewed them into 4Ps, it was obvious that I was going to have to trim them - so much fraying had eaten away at the edges that there was no way that I could sew them together and have them be any uniform size, so there were all trimmed down to 3 1/4"...and that meant that all the larger squares had to come down in size as well.  It took me about 6 hours to just trim all the blocks!  But I finished getting it all put back together and now have a quilt that measures 60" square.  It used to be 69" square...amazing what having a 1/4 seam allowance and some trimming down will do for a quilt!

It will make a lovely baby quilt...but one that has to be used a bit more gently since the fabrics are quite thin and may not withstand weekly washings!

Tease for Kevin

I am quilting a quilt for Kevin, who blogs at http://kevinthequilter.blogspot.com/.  The quilt will eventually be donated to QoV, but first Kevin is going to be hauling it around with him when he gives talks and presentations to guilds about QoV.  Since he calls somewhere in the mid-west home (when he's not doing the job that supports his quilting habit) and I am in the Pacific Northwest, he has had no input as to the quilting on this quilt.  Actually, he was nice enough to tell me to just have fun and so I am!!  I am trying all sorts of quilting patterns I have never tried before - gotta love doodling on paper first!!  So here are a few more pictures of what I have been working on since my last post:

There are three sections of the quilt made up of lots of scraps.  The top section is red, center is creams and the bottom is blue, but there are no discernible blocks, so my usual method of custom quilting the blocks just doesn't apply - most of the time I am going just for textures...LOTS. OF. TEXTURE.  Because the cream part shows the quilting more, it is getting a bit of special attention.  Lots of chalk markings and water-soluble blue pens have been used on this baby so Kevin will need to wash it before giving it away!!  I have been trying to make sure that all the markings are invisible as I finish each section, but I like my quilts to be totally clean when I give them to their recipient...I just spray with water and use a white towel if I need to do any rubbing.

If you have never seen what longarm quilters do to your quilt, you would be shocked!!  We don't hurt your quilt, but we are not always as gentle as you might wish!!  That's why I totally took apart my challenge quilt and I'm re-sewing it - it was partially hand quilted with 1/16"-1/8" seams, many of which were already coming apart from fraying.  If I were to put any tension on that top on my longarm, it would have just shredded.  That is why we all want the seams that end on the borders to be backspaced to lock them together - otherwise they pull apart and we have to carefully lock them down while they are on the frame.

**I keep track of the hours I put into quilting quilts - 23 on this quilt so far!

I am linking up with Freemotion by the River just because I'm having so much fun with this quilt!

Some Close-Up Pictures of Quilting

I finally found the pictures of my daughter's wedding autograph quilt!  So excited, since the actual quilt is in Hawaii (yeah, she has tough duty for the Army over there for the next three years!).

The whole quilt...no pattern, just mom winging it!

Had fun doing "ghost" quilting of the black block into the solid black.

The white is where the autographs are from all of her wedding guests...invisible at a distance!

Close up of the "ghost" quilting.

Fun with feathers!!

The back of the pink block...can you see the pink thread?

Love the texture of the back of this quilt!!!  What do you think?

Now for a sneak peek of what is on my frame right now...

Does this look familiar to anyone?


I am linking up with Freemotion by the River.

A Lovely Year of Finishes - August 2015 Edition

I am linking up with Sew Bitter Sweet Designs for August's A Lovely Year of Finishes.  I have this beautiful Irish Chain quilt top that I have to totally deconstruct and put back together.

It has been made by at least 3 people.  Parts (mostly the 2" squares) are hand pieced, with 1/16" seams, some parts by a sewing machine with awful tension problems and one sewing machine that had great tension.  It currently is 68x62...it will be interesting to see what size it ends up with 1/4" seams!  I'm getting to spend quality time with my seam ripper this month!! 

About 25-30 places where it was hand pieced were coming apart and many other places were fraying really badly.

I want to have this quilt used when I am finished with it and I'm afraid it would fall apart with the first wash.