Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Dropping off a quilt in Vancouver

I had the most amazing weekend. At the last minute my husband decided to visit his sick brother and so we flew from Ottawa to Vancouver for a long weekend. As you can imagine, my brother-in-law was so happy to see him. We were last there about 5 or 6 years ago with our children. This time it was a short and sweet visit with loved ones. We had a wonderful time reconnecting.
Jewel Tone Quilt after sewing-in-the-ditch

Several months ago, I decided that one of the quilts I've been working on would go to my brother-in-law and his family; Rob, Simone and Maddie. When I asked Simone a few years back about her quilt preferences, she mentioned jewel tones. This winter, as I'm getting ready to start quilting this piece that I had started in the winter of 2011, I realised that it was in jewel tones and the perfect quilt for them.

I had just emailed Simone that I would be finishing the quilt shortly and mailing it when we decided to visit. Thank goodness I only had to finish binding it!
Nine Patch Blocks
Nine Patch Blocks

As usual, this piece was quilted as a learning project for Cindy Needham's Design it, Quilt it: Free-Form Techniques course on Craftsy. I started quilting it as she advised - "stitch every stinking seam" and stitched most of the seams except for the 9 patch blocks. (See MakingProgress post.) I knew that I would be using a template to quilt motifs within them. Before taking Cindy's course, I would never have used a 7 inch template on a 6 inch square but the pattern going out of the square adds depth (and I didn't have to quilt the sashing!!!).

Details of the feathers and loops
Details of the feathers and loops

Quilt back
I considered quilting the border but since we ended up leaving for Vancouver (and honestly, after quilting 30 blocks, I was tired!) the borders are just stitched-in-the-ditch. Thank goodness for all that pre-work before the final quilting.

I love the feathers in this motif - even if I didn't realise that they were feathers until I was almost done. After I finished, I watched Cindy's next lesson on quilting feathers....I sure wish I had watched it BEFORE I quilted these. It would of helped.

The look on Maddie's face as she examined the quilt was priceless. She slept with the quilt while we were there. I had to make her promise that she would share the quilt with her mother and father, at least a little bit!

What I learned:

  • I had a little bit of tension problems with my red and blue threads. I changed my bobbin, needle and thread as well as adjusting the tension. I got it down to an acceptable level but I'm thinking that it might be time for a machine tune-up and cleaning. I've put a lot of mileage on my Jag since I got her.
  • Cindy has some great ideas for working on feathers - I can't wait to practice them.
  • It's very cool to quilt outside the box (of nine-patch)!
  • There is nothing in the world more wonderful to a quilter than giving a quilt that is going to be loved. Thanks Maddie!
This was posted on Fabric Tuesday at Quilt Story. See what others are working on!

6 comments:

  1. That came together beautifully. And you are right, stitching out of the squares really brings the whole thing together nicely. Well done!

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    1. Thank you. I wouldn't have tried it without someone's suggestion. I'm really glad I did. Now I'll have to try to remember that I can stitch outside the squares.

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  2. Nice job! I'm happy you showed what happened with stitching outside of the box. It turned out well. I love when the timing works out like it did here.

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    1. Thanks Rita. Yes, got to love it when these things work out. I wish I could deliver all of my quilts in person!

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  3. Update: Maddie has not shared the quilt with her family yet. It is either on her bed at night or cuddled with her while she is reading a book. However, she is already planning on passing the quilt on to her child, with her cherished teddy bear Ted Ted too, of course. We will cherish this gift of love. Thank you Andree

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    1. I hope that you time will come! There's bound to be a little time between her childhood and her own child :-)

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