Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears. No rhetoric, just a quilt. I put the pedal to the metal on the back end of this quilt and it’s finished, other than trimming threads. Oh who am I kidding? That will take me another week!
I was quilting at some crazy non-quilting hours of the day for me. 5:30am, lunch, 7pm. In other words, before work, during lunch and after work. I learned a lot working on a large (99″ x 99″) quilt on a long arm. First of all, there’s a better way to square a quilt than what I did – which was to eyeball it.
There’s something called a zero line tape measure or something like that. The general idea is you put the tape measure – which yes, is 0 in the middle and counts up in both directions – at the middle of your quilt and as you advance it each time, you make sure each side hits the same spot on the tape measure as it did the time before. Who’d a thunk?
Second, even though it involves unloading and reloading, it would’ve been better if I had rotated the quilt before quilting the side borders. Doing that vertically involved a whole lot of stopping and starting of threads…which is why it’s going to take me a week to cut them all.
The winner in all of this? The tension on my long arm was perfect – yay! And it fits nicely on a queen sized bed as shown in the photo above, with the 2 extra borders that I included. I quilted traveling leaves around the outside border, swirls in both directions on the inner border, Greek keys for both squares and triangles inside the quilt and a couple of other ones that I liked.
Hand sewing the binding went extremely fast and to be honest with you, I’m not sure how I actually got it done that quickly other than again this morning at 5:30 I had my needle in hand. It’s on the college kid’s bedroom for now since the 2 quilts I’ve made so far for that bedroom have both headed to college.
Oh and it looks discolored at the bottom? That’s an optical illusion. It’s hanging from the 2nd floor landing and the TV was on behind it which is what’s shining through! Linking up at http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2017/02/mystery-monday-link-up-finale.html .
A great design and a great tip on a measuring tape.
Thank you!
Congratulations on your finish, I’m still piecing mine!!
That quilt takes a long time, doesn’t it! But it’s worth it in the end.
Beautiful! I like your extra borders.
Thank you! I was trying to get it to a good size for a queen sized bed we have in the house and that seemed to work out well.
It’s gorgeous!
Thank you so much!
Truly useful and beautiful. Interesting tape measure. I’d like one of those!
Thank you! I did get a 120″ tape measure and taped it to the pole to help me keep my future quilts straight.
Standing ovation from your friends, romans, and countrymen! It turned out lovely! I need to get my car us off here and get sewing!
Thank you! I did a lot of chatting and not a lot of sewing today. Hopefully that will change tomorrow!
Fabulous!
Thank you!
It’s a real beauty. Congratulations
Beautiful!
Thank you!
Oh my! Absolutely stunning! Congratulations for all of your hard work ~ Joanne
Thank you!
Lovely quilt! Looks like a lot of work. Congrats on finishing. I, too, use the zero line measuring tape. I float my quilt tops and absolutely must use this tape to keep the quilt from twisting as I advance. It is a wonderful tool.
Thank you! I need to buy the zero line measuring tape before I quilt my next one. It makes perfect sense now that I’ve heard of it!
You are really getting the hang of that long arm! I love the way the pink just pops right out, and how the yellow blocks take my eye a little more time to focus in on. It is a beautiful quilt!!
Thank you! I was trying to get the pinks to pop, so I’m glad that showed up!
Fantastic! I’m going to have to check out the zero line tape. Rotating the quilt for borders is the best:). Great job on this beautiful quilt!
I saw somewhere else today that someone quilts the top border, then the entire inside section of the quilt and then at the end, starting from the bottom left they quilt the left side, rolling as they go along until they get to the top, and then they quilt the right side, rolling again as they go down. I still think turning the quilt 1/4 way is the best option, particularly if there is anything on the bias at all.
Your quilt came out beautiful! My top is completed but not quilted yet. What quilting design did you use?
I conquered and divided and then repeated what I came up with throughout the quilt. For instance, in the 3×6 neutrals between the magenta star points, those all have daisies in them. In the neutral squares, those all have Greek keys. There’s so much going on with the quilt that I think a pantograph would’ve also been just fine.
Beautiful! I, too, am adding additional width to mine because someone saw it and wanted it to fit a king size bed.
Are you adding more blocks as well? I thought about that as an option.
Wow! Beautiful!
Thank you! It’s nice to have it on a bed (errr…I just realized I didn’t trim those threads yet…).
I just printed all the patterns. I can’t resist. I want to make this.
Yes! It really was a lot of fun! And it’s one that can easily be made from scraps, specific fabrics or a combination of the 2.
Congrats on your finish! Looks awesome.
Thank you!
Wow what a lovely quilt! I like the pattern and your colour choices.
Thank you! I followed Bonnie’s color suggestions and was pleased how it turned out.
Congratulations! Quite impressive 🙂
Thank you!
Love your borders!!! It really adds to the quilt!
Thank you! Borders are still a challenge to me. I did a winding trail of leaves but I could definitely have seen a geometric border in this one as well.
Beautiful, but what a lot of work!!
Thank you! That was a lot of early morning and late nights in a short period of time. I’m still mentally unwinding.