Wholecloth Quilt - a UFO done and dusted !

Once upon a time, many many years ago (26 years to be precise), I started hand quilting a wholecloth quilt.  It was started when funds were limited so the wadding was scrappy pieces hand sewn together and all different textures.

Earlier this year, I dragged it out from the back of the cupboard where it had been 'hiding' for many many years to show a quilter friend who was doing a wholecloth quilt on her long-arm machine.    The quilt was hand quilted but for one whole border and about a quarter of another border.   

I can no longer hand quilt so instead of folding it back up and putting it back into the cupboard, I decided to finish the quilting on my domestic sewing machine.

It was hard work, I am definitely not used to throwing around a huge king sized quilt under my machine but I persisted and eventually got the quilting done.

Here it is with the quilting done.  The binding came with the quilt top, cut on the bias and only two inches wide.  I like to do my binding at least 3-1/2 inches folded in half.  So I carefully pinned the single binding to the quilt, sewed it on, turned it over and sewed it down, turning under as I went.  

Next dilemma - would the blue markings wash out after so many years.  It worried me so I took it along to a drycleaning firm, armed with a list of do's and do not's.  They assured me they would take good care of it and after a 3 day wait, I picked it up.

The blue markings had all washed out, the quilt hadn't lost it's shape and it looked amazing.

 

Why had it taken me so long to get this gorgeous quilt finished.  

And the next day I ordered another wholecloth quilt online, a smaller version this time (40" x 40") and this one will be machine quilted and definitely won't take 26 years to complete.

Happy Quilting !

Mother and Baby Giraffe

This is my mother and baby giraffe quilt.  I had a big bag of little black and white scraps, left over from other projects, and I wanted to use them up.  Cleaning out a bin of patterns, paper and old templates one day, I came across a page torn from one of my children's colouring in books of an outline of the mother and baby giraffe.    Here was a good idea for those black and white scraps !

I enlarged to about 36" long and traced my drawing onto tracing Vilene.  

Mamma Giraffe is coming together.  

Mamma and Baby Giraffe are all fused onto the background fabric and sewn down by machine applique using a buttonhole stitch.

This quilt is now ready to quilt. 

Happy quilting !

Street Directory Quilt

Wow ! It has been over 2 years since I last blogged.  Life (or should I say) and Sewing takes over and I must admit I am not a great one for taking progress photos as I sew.  But for the past few weeks I have been working on my local town's Street Directory, turning it into a quilt.

It started out like this - the A4 street directory enlarged many times and joined together.

I then transferred the whole map onto tracing Vilene because it is a lot easier to manage and can be folded up when not in use

The map was then divided into a number of sections, again traced onto the Vilene, and I proceeded to work on the first section.  The aim for doing this project was to use only fabric scraps from my stash, I won't be buying any fabrics to complete the project.  

This is the first section under way.  For the 'houses' I am foundation piecing each 'block of houses' using scrappy pieces of fabric.  The schools are yellow sections, parks / recreations grounds/ fields are done using green scraps.  

Here is a close up after I had added the streets.  The streets are made using grey scrap pieces and are fused down over the 'house blocks'  I have then machine appliqued using blanket stitch along each side of the streets / roads.

Here is the first two sections joined together and ready for quilting.   But before I can start the quilting process, I need to write the name of each street onto the quilt.  

Then came the first section of highway, a little bit of a challenge but I am really happy with how it came together.  I can't wait to add little extras to the quilt when quilting like the recreation grounds, the fishing lake (blue area) and the white lines on the highway.  

The next section has the major portion of the river running through town in it so I spent a whole day gluing varying blues onto the river outline and sewing them down.  Oh how I hate using glue, I somehow manage to get it everywhere but where it needs to go !

The quilt, when complete, will measure over 2 metres long and over a metre wide.  Halfway through the project and it has been so much fun to do, quite addictive really  

Happy quilting !