my first quilt!

This is my first quilt.

I had never quilted before but the idea has become more and more appealing lately. I had made a patchwork pillow (without quilting) in the summer, and the process of choosing colours, fabric, and assembling them was really fun. I loved it. So I decided to treat myself this fall and take an amazing three-day "nine-patch" workshop at the workroom, my favourite local sewing/fabric shop.



The bonus was they just received a fleet of Berninas to sew on. I was able to try one for the first time. Sweeeeeeeeet.



Of course what you see here is my own personal wonky handstitching. Not the product of a nice quiet Bernina - that's what I sewed the patches together with. Not by hand, are you crazy?



The mission of the class was to learn the basics of quilting by machine by creating a 32" x 32" "Nine-Patch" design quilt. Sort of a baby quilt, or a "lap" quilt. It was my first foray into quilting so I stuck with that size. Other participants expanded theirs and they were all absolutely gorgeous -- without exception! (Check out the workroom's flickr page, I think a few are over there.)

I started out by choosing my nine fabrics, focusing on blue-grey and variations. I included a silver fabric I would never normally have chosen (a little shine, how very non-quilt!) then threw in some horses, and some japanese -looking stuff, then I held up a red flowered fat quarter against all that blue and it was pretty yummy. So I threw in one fabric in red.




Later, when I did the "base" fabric -- all the strips around the edges -- I decided red would cheer it up ever more so I chose yet another red. Maybe I should have stuck with the planned blue-greys for an elegant, masculine look...but I couldn't. I had to throw a little retro in there. And I love the pale blue/red combo, always have. Sort of a 1930s palette, right?

We were also expected to put thread ties on here and there at regular intervals, but (no offense) those little threads hanging always sort of bugged me. But the real truth is I love to hand sew. So I tried my hand at that, too. I feel now the variegated blue thread is a little pale -- it sort of reads as white -- but c'est la vie.



The backing I like -- sort of a Japanese-kimono-type fabric. Chosen before the reds came along...;)



There are wonky bits but I still am pretty happy with it. Mainly it inspires me SO MUCH to make more quilts. It seemed fast though I suppose it was nine hours. But that's pretty fast, wouldn't you say? Nine hours...times three times the size for a queen size...equals 27 hours...uh....hmmmm.

Where am I going to get the time? Because I'm HOOKED now!

And we have a king size bed. It's going to take me a year...




xoxo
ella