Preparing with a quilt

Serena of Evan Wren Quilting asked if I was going to make a quilt for our soon-to-be-here 6 year old son. My first thought was I’ll never be finished in time! But as I pondered it I realized that if I pieced the top with my machine it might be possible to finish in time depending on when we get him. I suppose if I don’t finish the hand quilting by the time he gets here he might appreciate it more because he’ll witness first hand my efforts for a gift. LOL Hard to say with a little guy though. :-)

So urged by Serena, I looked through a couple quilt books and thought the Union Star Quilt in Civil War Sewing Circle, The: Quilts and Sewing Accessories Inspired by the Era (That Patchwork Place) by Kathleen Tracy was perfect for a young boy. It’s not too big and if I keep to similar colors of blue and red he’ll probably like it. When I first browsed the book it was one of my favorite patterns and I had started setting aside some possible fabrics for it. After some shuffling these are what I came up with.

The last day and a half I’ve spent sewing blocks and have 4 finished and one more cut. I made a mistake on two but I’m probably not going to bother taking it apart and resewing them. I’ve already done some seam ripping to get the first 2 blocks to the right size. The 1/4 inch mark on my machine must be slightly off and made the finished blocks much smaller than should be. Most people probably wouldn’t notice the mistakes anyway especially with 8 more blocks. Would you have noticed them if I hadn’t pointed it out?

Lickety-Split?

Finally got my sister’s lap quilt finished up Wednesday and packed it up today to send her at college. Overall, I like it, but I think if I did it again, I would do a second pieced border around the animal print border of squares or triangles in the blue, purple, and green to tie the top together better. Not bad for a first attempt if I say so myself.

This is the first quilt I’ve ever pieced on a machine and hand quilted. The pattern came from Lickety Spilt Quilts for Little Ones by Laurie Bevan. The piecing was quick since all the pieces are largish and on a machine. I’m not sure I’d do machine piecing again. I have been enjoying handpiecing lately and it is a lot of trouble to get out the machine. Plus it is way noisier than doing it by hand. I enjoy sewing machines better for making clothes than a quilt.

It was the hand quilting that took a long time. Took me 4 years of on and (mostly) off work to finish! In a hoop the hand quilting was enjoyable. I learned that with my harp callus on my middle finger I don’t need a thimble! (Gotta keep practicing that harp to keep up my thimble, er, callus. LOL) I also got down to 9 or 10 stitches per inch, more than the minimum required by the Amish quilters!

Yesterday, I added the label per Crazy Mom Quilt’s instructions. Should have probably lined it up with the plaid backing lines but didn’t really think about it until it was all stitched on. Oh well.

Now to catch up hand piecing the Civil War Chronicles quilt top!

Almost finished…

Sometimes things take awhile for me to finish especially when there’s no particular deadline. I’ve given myself a deadline and have been quilting away furiously to be finished before my sister goes back to college so she can take her lap quilt back with her.

Only three more border edges and corners to hand quilt then to bind the edge. I’m hoping only a week more of afternoons watching Star Trek (the original series of course) and quilting, but maybe more.

Isn’t this lamb sweet? Looks like a poodle to me, don’t you think?

So behind…

with the Civil War Chronicles quilt! I have 3 months waiting for me to finish. Month 2 is at least washed, cut, and some of the pieces are stitched together. I’ve promised myself that I will take on ZERO new for fun personal projects until I finish the ones I have waiting. Two in particular I hope to finish by the end of the summer, a crochet granny square vest for a good friend from college and a lap quilt for my youngest sister (started in May 2008!).

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