Hi everyone - today my mum is guest posting about her latest quilt finish.
Hello
I’m Adrianne’s Mum, Lynley.
Adrianne asked if I would like to do a guest post about this quilt I recently finished.
My response was not hugely enthusiastic, more shrugs and maybes than “of course, I’d love to dear”.
I feel like a bit of a fraud writing a post about quilting as I haven’t been doing a lot. but I’ll give it a go.
Most of the fabrics are charm squares from the 2wenty Thre3 range by Eric and Julie Comstock and were bought, on impulse, at the end of an online order. The impetus to make a quilt was a New Year’s resolution to make use of impulse buys and also to get back into quilting again with some small, simple projects. The block used is called a Disappearing four-patch. I probably first saw it on pinterest and then found a video on Missouri Quilts of a quilt being made (
this one, I think). The piecing looked fun with enough of a challenge to keep me going. Once the blocks were made I decided to loosely group the strong yellows and oranges together.
The two borders were added and then, the perennial, vexing question. How to quilt? Straight lines and monofilament have been my preferred safe approach, but I was keen to add some curves. After weeks of sitting folded on the sewing table and periodically spread on the floor and puzzled over, Adrianne suggested quilting concentric circles. This fitted the bill nicely.
The first circle was marked using an inverted large glass mixing bowl, and then sewn with a walking foot. I continued, in an outwards direction, quilting circles 3/4 inch apart using the walking foot guide. The smallest 3 or 4 circles were marked using a compass and also sewn with the walking foot. The smallest “circle” is rather wonky and is the best I could manage. In the middle is a slightly wonky plus. If I was making this quilt again I would centre the smallest circle around a patterned part of the quilt, not a plain square!
The binding is made from the back of the quilt. To do this, carefully trim the excess batting away and then trim the backing fabric 3/4 inch from the edge of the quilt and fold in half and press. The corners are then folded diagonally and then the rest of the backing, now the binding, is folded over the edge of the quilt. This will create mitred corners and the binding can be hand or machine stitched down (although with either method you will need to stitch up the mitred corners by hand first).
I enjoyed all parts of making this quilt and have a sense of satisfaction with the finished article.
Thanks Mum! Mum has definitely been overly modest in this post. She hasn't been quilting a lot lately, but she's really an accomplished quilter and her quilts are always impeccable. She taught me to sew and all the quilting basics, which I still use today.
