A Letter from Lotta Quilt - Finished!

I'm embarrassed to say that I've had this quilt top made from Lotta Jansdotter's gorgeous Glimma fabric (available here and here) sitting around, unfinished, since January.  January, people.  That's months and months ago and in the end it took me about 2 and a half hours to quilt it up.

I did have fun with the quilting.  I wanted to make sure the quilting emphasised the envelope design, and I used tiny pebbles to outline the "address window". 

Lots of different sized pebbles quilted in the envelope part make it feel like one of those padded envelopes.  I love imagining that there's a special treat inside.

To go with the envelope theme, I quilted mini envelopes in the border (totally inspired by this quilt).

All the quilting is done with Aurifil 50 weight thread (colour 2600).  Quilting this quilt was my first time using Aurifil (although I've since used Aurifil for my Blackberry Winter Blossom Quilt) and I had been saving it to use for quilting.  I will probably do a more complete review of Aurifil once I've spent a bit more time with it, but on an initial encounter, I'm quite smitten.  First, this colour is fantastic - it seems to go perfectly with all the fabrics in the quilt top and the backing.  Secondly, I can see why people say Aurifil is really good value for money.  This quilt made a much smaller dent in the spool than I was expecting (and we all know that pebble quilting uses HEAPS of thread), plus the bobbins seemed to last for a lot longer than usual.  Happy.

I think Nat's post about zigzags and chevrons influenced my choice of backing fabric, and I'm so glad it did, because I think this print from Cloud 9 Fabrics Simpatico collection is just right.

Quilt Stats
Pattern: my envelope quilt pattern

Finished Size: Approximately 30" by 40"

Fabric: Lotta Jansdotter's Glimma collection, Robert Kaufman Essex Yarn Dyed Linen in Black 

Backing: Chevron in Minty from Cloud 9 Fabrics Simpatico collection

Binding: Pearl Bracelet in HiHo Silver

Pieced and quilted by: me

Linking up with finish it up friday at crazy mom quilts.

This quilt is the sixth and final of my third quarter goals that I've finished.  Six out of eight ain't bad!  Link up now with Leanne at she can quilt as part of the 2013 Finish Along - the link up is open until 7 October, so you have a little time.

Equilateral triangle quilt

I spent the weekend cutting triangles for this quilt for my youngest brother.  I laid out the triangles I had cut at my parents' place after our weekly family dinner to work out whether I had cut enough and hopefully make up a pile for each row so I could start putting the quilt together.

I worked out that I didn't have enough triangles (I cut approximately 270 and decided I will actually need about 360) and that more solids would be good.  So I didn't get to make piles to start stitching the rows, but it was progress nevertheless.

Apologies for the blurry photo - it is taken with an iphone under artificial light.  I am very happy with how the colours in this quilt are working, and looking forward to getting it underway.

Fabric aficionados will recognise many of the prints - a non-exhaustive list includes a couple from Lotta Jansdotter's "Echo" line, a couple of Joel Dewberry prints, from Modern Meadow and Aviary 2, some Martha Negley Feathers, a couple of the cross-hatch sketch prints from Timeless Treasures (in cream and red/orange), a couple of prints from Anna Maria Horner's latest collection, Field Study, a grey print from the Monsterz collection from Cloud 9, and a blue from the DS Quilts range I picked up a Spotlight.