WIP Wednesday 9/5/2012

Blue and White Bowls

Paper pieced bowls pattern by Regina Grewe

Original layout, Broken Dishes blocks in the corners

Free motion quilting, buttons

Mostly from stash

11" x 22"

Completed 9/1/2012

Square of fabric, folded diagonally, pressed. Made four for the corners on the back of the quilt.

Backing fabric

Folded triangle placed between quilt top and backing

Quilt sandwich assembled for pillowcase style finish, chosen to avoid binding. Could have chosen an "escape hatch" finish but it would have broken up the teapot design on the back.

Sewed 1/4" inside the edge of quilt top, catching triangle in stitching.

Note several inches left unsewn along bottom edge, which will allow the work to be turned right side out.

Quilt turned right side out

Seen from the back. Teapot design intact. Chopstick indicates open space under the triangles. Usually slip yardstick shaped pieces of wood across the top and bottom of the quilt. Triangles hold the wood in place. In this instance I plan to put a piece of cardboard in the corners to give the quilt body for display on a plate rack.

Did some free motion quilting in the yellow background areas. Clips are holding the little opening shut.

 I usually close an opening by edgestitching all around the perimeter of a quilt, but I didn't think it was appropriate for this design. Forget about slipstitching. So I used some Aleene's Quick Dry Tacky Glue to seal the opening, and let it dry.

Back of the quilt

I decided to sew buttons on the light blue border. Here's a bag I recently got at an antique flea market for $3. Why not?

I pulled out a bunch of white buttons that were about the same size. It didn't matter to me that they weren't identical, and I just laid them on the quilt, not worrying about distributing the buttons so that they were perfectly symmetrical as far as having 2 or 4 holes. It adds a bit of whimsy.

Finished quilt

From the back

How it will look on the plate rack in my living room. There is no cardboard on the back of the quilt in this picture. The quilt was certainly flopsy-mopsy and wouldn't stand up straight, as I predicted. to take the picture I just taped the quilt to the wall with little rolls of masking tape.

I accomplished some other things this week. It helped that I took the week off of work. Not too long ago I received a box of mostly quilt tops from Marilyn L., who is the coordinator of Vacaville Binky Patrol. The finished quilts will be donated to Stanislaus Family Justice Center, a local one-stop center offering help and hope for victims and survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, child abuse, and elder abuse. Each child receives a quilt.

This music-themed quilt just needed binding.

Back - music-themed fabric

Sports-themed quilt top

The yellow fabric looked kind of familiar. Sure enough, it was a different colorway to the blue fabric I used in All Kinds, a quilt I made for my brother Wayne C.

The quilt top was long and narrow. I wanted to add with to the sides with a border but I didn't want more length. I decided to remove a section of the length. See the black rectangle above. Everything below it will be removed. I'm thinking of using the section to make an accompanying pillow.

Section removed. I like these proportions better.

Sides trimmed

Border added. Note the top and bottom strips are not as wide as the sides. The quilt didn't need more length and there wasn't a lot of fabric left so I made it work.

I did a pillowcase finish and edgestitched around the perimeter of the quilt. I just have to tie a few dozen knots of embroidery floss and the quilt will be done, ready for delivery to the center on Friday.

Debbie