Quilting

The other day I spoke to Rachael from All it took was just one Stitch... on the phone for her birthday. I rang her out of the blue as a suprise because she had been offline for so long with her lightning fried modem. Boy it's wierd to chat to someone on the phone that you only know from emails. Hearing their voice can totally change the picture you have of them in your head. Luckily Rachael and I had lots to chat about which was really great fun and I'm hearing her real voice now when I read her blog which is also fun.

But anyway we were chatting about our quilting. She said she had some quilting snaps to put up and I said that I've made heaps of 'quilting things' and done loads of sewing but really only ever made one complete quilt and its on our bed.

Marji also asked me in an email if I was a quilter too and well... I am! With a fabric stash bigger than my yarn stash (!) and a few quilt UFO's floating around to prove it.

Here are some shots of the quilt I was talking to Rachael about. This one is in situ in our bedroom. I began this quilt about 5 years ago when JT and I were first living together. It's totally handpieced and quilted. It's english paper pieced and I kind of made up the pattern as I went along from a pile of fabric that I had accumulated and inspired by books of my mothers.

It's an odd kind of four patch in a square, set on point, inside kind of rails or strips. Its not a medallion or all over scrappy quilt but it looks a bit 'scrappy' nonetheless.


The next shot shows the hand quilting off better. The quilt was made on and off over the 12 months that we were engaged, the first early months of our marriage, the 9 months of my pregnancy with Milly, our move to Wollongong and the first few months of my pregnancy with Gemma. It's been on our bed now for almost two years, after about three years in the making.


I'm yet to make a label for the back telling the story of its making but I will get to that one day.... (dont laugh!) This next shot shows the back. Instead of going totally plain for the back I used blocks of fabric, randomly joined that I had left over from the piecing. I'm a little phobic about having too much fabric left over after a quilt is finished. Scraps are OK but not huge bits. So now I have a kind of reversible quilt.


I'm pretty proud of this quilt because I did NOT succumb to the lure of the machine ONCE not even for the binding!! It's a real labour of love. I would not choose the same fabrics if I was making a quilt now or the same kind of design but luckily I still like it and It's a special special piece to me because I just kept making it and making it and making it, it all that time, until it was finished.

I have another quilt on the go which I began in a machine quilting workshop about two years ago. It's a sawtooth star set on point using all civil war fabrics which JT VERY kindly brought back from a work trip for me (Ahhh - so thoughtful!) . I plan to get that one done this year! There I've said it!! I'll post a shot of it too one day soon.

Happy quilting all and happy knitting!! I'm off to see what maternity winter woolies I have around to take to the states and to weave in the ends of my ISE scarf.. Its all GO here!!!