A Sweet Finish

This ended up being the perfect finish for February. I was able to get the last stitches in the quilt last Friday and then throw it in the tub for a quick soak. Nope! No bleeding from any of those darker red fabrics. Yay! Write out a simple label and then it was time to hand deliver to my sister on Saturday.

Petra's quilt is finished!

She had forgotten that I had promised to hand quilt it over this winter! Too funny. I was hurrying, trying to get it all done before she left for a month long vacation. Oh well. Now it's done, totally checked off my list and hopefully, just in time for a little Valentines Day lift. 

Love the scrappy 16-patches esp.

I ended up doing a machine, stitch-in-the-ditch grid around all the blocks and in the seams of the inner border. I was hoping this would free me up from doing an intensive hand quilting effort, but in reality, there was plenty to do regardless. This is a big quilt. 82" x 98" before washing!

Surprisingly serene looking

Though the piecing was done years and years ago, it felt like an old friend. So many memories were brought to mind of the time spent making this top. Lots of the fabrics felt very familiar to me too as she had gifted me with the scraps and leftovers afterwards. Those pieces have made their way into many of the quilts made later on though honestly, I had totally forgotten the connection!

Very cuddle worthy...

The Geese Tracks block is still one that I favor, although I can only recall making one other quilt with it. Love the old fashioned simplicity and charm of the block. How different it can look depending on the color/fabric it's made with. 

Lots of sweetness

So very happy to have this quilt behind me and know that finally, finally it's going to be used, loved and appreciated. It's very sweet to know that my sister still loves it even after all these many years! Neither one of us mentioned that it was also used as decoration for her wedding reception, hanging on the wall behind her cake table. That part is just sad as she's now a widow. I tell myself that it's much more useful now as a finished quilt than it ever was as a quilt top. Let the new adventures begin!

I think she likes it!

In other quilt happenings around here, I've been going after the 'Country Stars' quilt project like a crazy woman. I keep making mistakes and then have to make corrections somewhere, somehow. So far I'm not letting it get me down as this quilt really doesn't need to be fantastic, only nicely done. I'm currently working on the applique prep work for the outer borders, with high hopes that the whole thing will perk up just a teeny tiny bit. Still so very bemused to be working with this particular color palette once again. Just doesn't feel as natural as it once did!*sigh

Country Stars before applique

And I'm also trying to keep up with the improv. quilt projects for my quilt meetings. We just finished up with the 3rd meeting and now I've got everyone sewing their blocks or 'slabs' together. Next meeting will be all about trimming and cross cutting for the rows. I'm trying to keep the meetings at a pace to work well with both the beginning sewers and also, the long time ones. Don't want anyone to get overwhelmed to the point of quitting, but as of meeting #4 I'm expecting to lose at least one young mama. Sewing machine problems and too much going on as she currently home schools her children. Really can't move any slower though or the experienced sewers are going to start getting super frustrated. 

Quilt Meeting progress

I've worked it out so there will be 7 meetings in all {ending the last of March}, with everyone potentially bringing their finished quilt top to the last one. At that point we'll regroup with anyone interested in moving forward with hand quilting. Technically I could probably show the basics of machine quilting too, but I just don't feel very good at that part of quilting. I'm very hopeful that our one 'long arm' quilter lady will jump in at that point and offer to help whoever wants to go that route. 

Always finding new inspiration

On a different note, I have been admiring this particular fabric in my latest quilt in the hoop. Just love that flower shape, how simple and easy it looks. Might have to keep something similar in mind for a future quilt!

January Stitching

I've been spending a lot of time doing hand work this past week or so. After ignoring Coronacrazy for much too long, once again, I have found the motivation to do a little hand stitching. Which sorta morphed into a LOT of hand stitching, but who's complaining?

Coronacrazy border work

This picture {above} as taken several days ago when I thought there might be time to post, but then the opportunity vanished. As of last evening, I can happily state that border #3 and #4 are either finished or getting loads of stitching as well. Funny how I don't want to work on this quilt project at all and then something clicks and it's really all that I want to do. Just can't work in more than a couple hours a day of hand applique or my elbow starts feeling it sooo I usually switch to hand quilting and then I'm okay.

Petra's quilt

This is my sisters quilt top that I agreed to hand quilt for her. I made the top back in the winter of 2006 or 2007. She had bought all the fabric in a period of about two or three years and just didn't think she had the skills or mojo to make 'what she wanted'. Which was ironic, because she couldn't really even articulate what that might be. Eventually we reached an agreement. If she showed me three pictures of quilts that she liked, gave me free reign with her fabric, allowed me to add a few fabrics of my own choice, then I would put together a quilt top for her to have quilted in her own way, on her own dime.

Fabrics are all close to 15 plus years old

And yes. She paid me a small amount to piece the quilt top together, mostly so it would get done and not languish behind all the other projects that I always seem to have on the go! Anyway... I took those three quilt pictures and her fabrics--started playing with ideas, finally drawing up this particular plan.

Basic blocks

Her fabric was a mind boggling mixture to me at the time, with such a wide range of bubblegum pinks to orangey corals, lots of creams, taupes and that mushy paisley print I finally settled on using in the setting triangles. In the end, I only added a couple cream fabrics for the center, and then went and bought the cream text fabric for the outside border. I remember deliberating on whether or not to add a brighter color for the border, but fell down on the side of letting the 'glow' work its magic from the 16 patches alone. 

I've always felt that if she had made her own design, it would have ended up being much wilder and sharp looking instead of the soft, cozy thing that I tend to gravitate towards. But here we are and it ended up being a huge learning curve for me in being bolder in using fabrics that don't necessarily look like they belong together! We had a little sit down just before I started cutting fabric and I made her tell me, 'Are you SURE you want all these fabrics in the same quilt?' lol

Marking the quilt top

It's been an interesting experience to come back to it so many years later. Wowsers, has my piecing improved! Who wouldn't thunk it when I continually cut off points on purpose? The corners of the quilt were very warpled which makes me think that I could not have properly trimmed each block to size. Hmm... I managed to get it sandwiched and pinned regardless and now all the machine quilting part is behind me.*whew! Haven't ruined it yet! Just stitch in the ditch around the blocks so maybe the quilt will hold up when her two year old mauls it on her bed. I'm expecting this quilt to be very well used...

My daughter snagged a picture of me while the quilt was in the process of getting marked, and we both agreed that I'm much more smiley when quilting. Even when doing a part of it that I don't particularly care for! We had just gotten through a long day attending a funeral of an older friend, and I had mentioned that when I died, don't bother wasting money on a floral casket piece as they could just throw a quilt over the casket and be done. She argued that one needed to go inside the casket with me otherwise I might be mortally offended. And on and on we went with me telling her 'Don't you dare waste a quilt by putting it in the ground with me!' 

Black humor. It's what our family has always done and seems to be good for getting us through. It's been a tough month as one of her co-workers suddenly dropped at work the other day, having a heart attack and dying right after the ambulance got her to the hospital, and now a family friend dying unexpectedly while home alone. Just makes you think. And stitch a lot if you are a quilter like me....