Finished quilts: 2008

2008 is the year that I feel I actually became a quilter. After fooling around, starting projects and never finishing them, not pushing myself, I bought a nice sewing machine in hopes of improving myself and my sewing skills. Around the same time, a friend had a baby and I knew I wanted to make a quilt as a gift.

I wanted to free-motion quilt it and put the binding on the proper way. To do this, I had to practice which meant making a practice quilt:

finished blanket

It's too small to be useful to me but I didn't want to give it away since it was full of mistakes. I use it for picnics and I don't mind when it gets dirty.

finished!

Block Name: none, it’s just two pieces of fabric with batting in between
Blocks: none
Borders: none
Finished size: 44”x60”? I never measured it
Quilting: free-motion to follow the flower pattern
Binding: double fold binding, sewn on by machine and finished by hand
Backing: pink stripe cotton
Memorable movies watched during construction: I don’t remember watching anything while quilting but during the binding phase I watched Marie Antoinette (the new one)
Funny story: I bled on this quilt when I hooked my finger on a pin during quilting. Ouch!
Lesson learned: sew fast, move quilt medium. Also, don’t quilt where you can’t see.

After this was finished, I quilted the baby quilt. I had so much fun picking out fabrics and sewing the blocks. It’s the first time I used orange!

washed

I really wanted to keep this for myself…or at least make another one for me. I didn’t have enough fabric leftover and it’s probably for the best. I was a little sick of making log cabins.

detail

Block Name: inspired by this quilt
Blocks: 8”x8”
Borders: none
Finished size: 40”x56”
Quilting: free-motion stipple pattern
Binding: double fold binding, sewn on by machine and finished by hand
Backing: light pink flannel with tiny white dots!
Memorable movies watched during construction: Lots of episodes of The Munsters
Funny story: Nothing really went wrong with this one…which was a relief.
Lesson learned: practice, practice, practice.

The last quilt I finished this year was made from fabrics already in my stash. That is, it was supposed to be made from my stash but I needed more green. And blue. Oops.

blue green quilt

I’ve been using it on my bed because I love it and it also happens to match the green walls in my bedroom. Finally, a quilt just for me!

blue green quilt

Block Name: inspired by Denyse Schmidt’s “Hop, Skip and a Jump” quilt and color combo and name from Twiddletails's lovely quilt.
Blocks: 15”x13.5”
Borders: none
Finished size: 60”x81”
Quilting: free-motion stipple pattern
Binding: double fold binding, sewn on by machine and finished by hand
Backing: cute blue and white plaid flannel.
Memorable movies watched during construction: Lots of episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Funny story: I quilted the entire thing with the feed dogs up! I couldn’t understand why the quilting was so hard…I thought it was because it was a larger quilt than the previous two. Nope…feed dogs up.
Lesson learned: obviously: double check the feed dogs. Also, gardening gloves with little rubber dots help when the quilt doesn’t want to move.

So, that’s it...seven quilts in just over two years. I do have a lot of quilts that will be easy to finish quickly. Two are nearly completed tops and I have all the blocks completed for three more. I would really love to finish them and give them away so I can move on to things that are more inspiring. Maybe I could try to average one finished quilt a month for the next year? We’ll see..

Comments