The Wedding Quilt Is Done!

Wedding Bells!

My son and his future bride are getting married two weeks from today!  This is the quilt that I made for them.  The pattern is interlocking rectangles, like a Celtic knot; the rectangles are batiks.  I loved the idea of the open geometric figures twined together, linked but each with its own space.  After almost 45 of my own marriage, that's how I think a successful marriage needs to be, together but with space to be yourself.

To highlight the colors and to keep an "urban" feel, I used a small white-on-white print for the background and grays for the borders.  The first border is a tone-on-tone charcoal; The second is a lighter gray that looks like granite.

The quilting was done by Janet at Farmhouse Quilts in Southold, NY.  I had already decided that I wanted something with curves to soften the straight lines in the quilt.  I was thinking of spirals, because the teal and the white both have spiral patterns in them.  Janet suggested the same thing, so I knew she'd do a great job.






The spacing is about 3/4".   We chose a silvery-teal thread that blends differently with each of the colored fabrics.  It looks almost green on the green, is invisible on the blue, and shines silver on the purple.

The back is pretty, too!  You can really see the color of the thread on the plain bleached muslin.   Not so much in the photo, because the back is in the shade.  There was no way to open up the quilt completely except by hanging it from the clothesline.  And as you can see in the first photo, even turned sideways it dragged on the ground!  This is supposed to be a queen-size quilt, but it is really BIG!

The binding came out wide on the back, about 3/4".  That was unintended -- I guess I'm used to using high-loft batting for baby quilts, and I cut the strips wider than necessary.  But I don't mind.  The binding fabric is a black batik with lots of subtle movement in it.  I'm happy to show it off a little!

Finally, I used some of the batik scraps to have a little fun with the label.  The background is a square from a charm pack -- the label is big because I forgot to trim it back before I attached the edges.  Duh! 

 I really don't like the marking pen, it just doesn't make a good line.  But I was reluctant to try to embroider the label at this point.  Just look how sweet the fabric is!  Wedding bells!

 Much love and happiness to Charles and Christine on their wedding day!

Summer of Quilts!

Two whole months without a blog post.  Maybe it should be called a "bog"!  But there's been lots of sewing going on, and more to come.

An Irish Baby Quilt

You can't see it in the photo, but the label fabric has little storks all over it.  Sweet!

My niece's new baby, Miles, arrived in May, so of course I just had to make him a quilt.  And because he lives in Ireland, it had to be flannel.  Guess it could have been an Irish Chain, but I wanted something simple that would go fast.  Good plan, especially if one ends up making two quilts!

I started the quilt last winter, but decided that I didn't like the fabric at all (it will become a charity quilt that someone will love).

 

Cute fabric, but...

It just doesn't work as a Disappearing Nine-Patch (bleagh!)

So I started over.  Much better, I think!  And I got a great deal on a charm pack on the web :-D

Nice variety of light and dark.  I think he'll like it!

Isn't this cute?  (Yeah, this one's not too square, but Miles won't care!)

 The brown fabric is Minkee.  So soft, and I'll bet the babies love the bumps.  But what a pain!  It stretches like crazy, and it melts under normal quilt-pressing conditions.

Fortunately, I ran across the same fabric at Jo-Ann.  Some strategic ripping and Y-seams and the melted squares were replaced.  Found some of the blue snowflake fabric, too, so I used it for the backing.

 Best of all, I managed to churn out a nice big pile of four-patch units for the Easy Street Mystery Quilt, using the squares as leaders and enders as I stitched the baby quilt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wedding Bells!

My wonderful son became engaged in January to the Lovely Christine.  The wedding is in July!  Not much time to make an elaborate quilt, but thankfully, Christine's tastes run to the modern (i.e., simple).   I picked a geometric pattern (http://aquilterspath.blogspot.com/2013/01/happy-new-year.html) with a white and gray background and rich batiks as the focus fabrics.


This puppy is BIG!  Queen size -- thank goodness for my nice big sewing table -- just getting the final border on the quilt top was a challenge, never mind attaching the binding after it was quilted. 

Sneak peek!  The quilt top before heading off the the long-arm quilter, Janet at Farmhouse Quilts (she also has a Facebook page, Farmhouse Quilt Company).  Can you see the teal and green peeking out?

 Almost done -- I'm hand-sewing the binding to the quilt back now, then just need to add the label.  The next post will be the big reveal!

AND...  I'm spending that binding time dreaming about the quilt I'll make for my lovely niece, Molly, who is getting married in August!  (I told you this was a summer of quilts!).  She has requested a lap quilt for cool summer boat rides.  Fun!  I can't wait to get started.  Blue and yellow, maybe?  Maybe paper-pieced boats?  Anyone want to help me decide?