Katie's birthday quilt

OK - commitment time.  I started Katie's queen sized quilt in 2005 (eek), when we were students sharing a house together.  4 years later, engagements, pets and weddings, it's still not complete.

However, it's getting a lot closer.  At the moment it's got wineglass stitching (all by hand) through the middle, which took significantly more time than I predicted, but the effect on the back has come up really nicely.

I tend to do all my piecing by machine, and quilt by hand.  While painfully slow, the feel of the handsewn quilt is just so nice - I've got one of each on the top of my bed at the moment, and the handquilted one has far more flexibility.  Personal preference I guess.

For the borders I've gone for solid colours, with strong lines to break it up.  Around the final border it will be 4 lines stitched side by side - Katie actually asked for this, but it causes some bother, as I keep flopping around with 4 needles.  In reality it would probably be easier to just sew around it 4 times, but that would be the easy way to do it.

The edging is a bit of a struggle, as I want to bring in the colours in the middle into the edge.  I'd previously bought all the fabric for the edge, but then it was destroyed in a fire (better the stack of fabric than my half done quilts) - so I've started the hunt again.


At the moment I'm leaning toward this fabric - picking up the yellow and green.   The colours aren't showing up very well.  It was hard enough trying to get the cats to stop playing under the quilt for long enough to take a photo, so I wasn't worrying about the lighting and colours so much!
It's quite funny to flick through the photos quickly as Charlie was hiding and moving about under the quilt top, and you can see it move!

Best get to the sewing and less of the writing, or it'll never get done!  A loft aim of having it finished before Katie's wedding would be nice (April 2010), or maybe I'll get booted from the bridal party!

In the beginning

It started with needing a blanket.  While a normal 21 year old would go buy one, I decided to make one.  And with my first demented little yellow and orange patchwork square, it was all over.

So was the interest in yellow and orange.  4 years later, I've started 1 skirt, 1 dress, 5 quilts and 1 stuffed toy.  I've finished 2 quilts.  The result, a fabric spill.  While partially attributable to the breeding quality of fabric (I go to buy one small thing and walk out arms laden), it's mostly attributable to a lack of focus.  And thus you, blog, will inspire me to limp a little closer to the completion stage.

Hell, if the internet can provide lolcats surely it can provide inspiration. ? .


So the works stand as such -