My Quarter Circles Quilt and the Big Rescue

I put the last stitch in my Quarter Circles quilt on the evening of December 30th. So exciting! Then, on December 31st, I washed the quilt like I always do. Absolute disaster. There was so much bleeding in this quilt that I could hardly believe my eyes. And yes, of course I used color catchers.

Quarter Circles

So... I threw it back in the washer with even more color catchers. I'm not sure if it made any difference because while some areas looked marginally better, others seemed to look worse. {Was that even possible?} I wish I would have thought to take pictures so you could have seen the before and after, but frankly, I was too traumatized. Anyway, Googling for answers helped me come up with this. It was the best article I could find that didn't involve using Synthrapol, a product I couldn't get to for several days. I tell you, the woman is a miracle worker when it comes to understanding the details of fabric bleeds.

A close up of some details....

After repeated soaks in extremely hot water {something that feels very counter intuitive} and a clean/clear type detergent, my quilt finally stopped hemorrhaging.*gulp  I made very sure that the last clear soak was 12 hours just to be absolutely, positively sure the dyes were finished bleeding.

Looking at the texture...

I am still very sad that my quilt doesn't have that brilliant strip of contrast from that narrow creamy white sashing. That was one of the best parts of this quilt and was also {probably Murphy's law} the fabric most affected by the red bleed. It really, really hurts that my lovely quilt has a small amount of fading throughout and it's brand new. However, I am extremely happy to have found such a good remedy and be able to see all but the tiniest bit of pink tinge completely removed from my quilt. My family assures me that no-one else will ever notice that little bit of pink, but of course I can see the difference and probably always will.

Love seeing the hand quilting on the back.

So shocking too, to have that much bleeding occur when I faithfully pre-wash all of my fabrics before I ever use them. Wowsers was I ever naive! At first I thought that the culprit was my border fabric, but after re-examining the quilt multiple times, I'm sure it was another one (or two or five) of the reds inside the blocks. Besides, I've used that particular red before alongside a cream muslin and never had any bleeding whatsoever. And believe me when I say that I will NEVER 'casually' wash another red and white quilt again. Oh no. A good long soak first, my dear friends, is the only way to safely remove those nasty floating dyes, maybe even at the fabric {pre-quilt} stage if there are reds involved?

That sashing!

So.. As you can see, the quilt survived all the abuse heaped upon it and will live to grace my bed or wherever else I think to use it. Looking at the quilt, I am very glad I decided to stick with the bigger width stitching in the circles and the smaller little squares in the background. The texture just makes me smile.

Interesting how some fabrics fade into the background and some don't.

Which is good because there will always be this little ache of what could have/should have been with this particular quilt. I'm grateful to my husband for being so nice about giving up our master bath for basically an entire day. I think he was afraid that I would cry and he really hates it when that happens.

Just a tiny bit of contrast now in the skinny white sashing....

He even offered to buy me a top loading style washing machine so that my quilts can be washed in a larger amount of water. I think I will stick with the one I have, but gotta love that my husband understands how much work {and love} I put into quilting.

Just to be clear, this is still one of my very favorite quilts I've ever finished. It really feels like a quilt that managed to turn out as well or better than what I originally envisioned--low volume background with subtle contrast, graphic red and white sashing to 'pop', an element of vintage charm in the less-than-perfect circles and of course that older style blend of fabric prints. I do love the slightly romantic, soft, cozy look and feel to to it. Now, of course, it will always have a story attached to it as well. So very glad I was able to rescue it from complete ruination....