Finally, a Finish for Myself

In hindsight, I'm not really sure what possessed me to think I wanted to make a black & white quilt. It's definitely not my colors, but now that it is all finished, I am pleased. This quilt is part of the Black & White challenge. It sat for the longest time in three large pieces. Then I quilted one of them, and it sat another 3 months. About 3-4 weeks ago, I decided I'd rip out the quilting, sew all 3 together, and requilt it. I mostly hated the backing I'd initially chosen, but the quilting had it's issues as well.
This quilt has 6 pannels that are like this. Here's another look at the blocks in progress, and a peek at the initial plan for the quilt. Each block has four photos printed on fabric of my kids. I know that these are not the best quality, and have since learned of another product that is better to use, but I was not changing anything once it was together.

The quilting was moderately challenging for me because my machine has a TINY throat/neck and it's a real pain to cram it into it in order to quilt the center of the quilt (now we all understand just WHY I really want that long arm...). This quilt is on the order of 52" x 75". It is quilted mostly in red thread (despite the fabrics being largely white) because I wanted the quilting to blend on the backside, which is solid red. I didn't want to have any areas where poorer tension might show if I used a top thread that was white. I am pleased with the red thread decision. It actually looks pretty good.

In the red areas, I free quilted feathers. They are far from perfect, but nice, and better than more stippling. What I really love is how I quilted the black 9-patches around the photos. I consternated over what to do for 2 weeks, and ended up doing more free feathers in the black squares, and nothing on the photos (which unless up close just appear soft gray).

...a peek of the back (which is likely not too visible without double clicking).

It'll keep me warm this winter, and will remind me of my cutie kids forever.

First of Six

These are oddly more tedious than I expected. There's lots of little triangle points to attempt to preserve (and I see one on a churn dash that I need to fix!). See the previous post for the entire layout. My boys are away at Nana's until tomorrow or Thursday, so I will hopefully get most of the blocks together while my sweet girly naps.

A 2009 Project

I joined the Black & White challenge (see sidebar for link) recently. I have been inspired by what the participants have been showing. All I had to show for weeks was my effort of gathering fabrics. I didn't really have a quilt plan, or an idea what my one additional color would be. Now I think I know that I will use shades of deep red to burgundy. I hope to use this quilt (a lap size) on my bed in the winter (when I freeze and my hubby sweats!).
Here's a peek at some of the 4.5" blocks I had cut last week. I actually have several more fabrics too, they just did not make it into the picture.

The arduous task of making 96 HST's... These are done half dark and half light, for the points of the six large blocks (sixteen each).

I played with my new EQ6 program a bit since receiving it on Christmas. I gave up on completing the outer border, but you get the general idea. The quilt is kind of simple, but I hope to let the patterns of the fabrics be the focal. Additionally, where there are tan squares below, will be black and white photographs of my kids, printed on fabric.

Here's a sneek glimpse at a few of the pictures I have chosen for this...They will be about 4" square when printed. Pretty cute. The girl IS a camera magnet.