I'm quite happy that I have finally finished this quilt. I'm not sure when I designed it, whether it was in Electric Quilt 4 (EQ4), my first quilt designing program or its sequel EQ5. It was back shortly after the turn of the century. Not only did I design this one, but I also dyed the fabrics. It was the first time I had done that. Back then, I was taking classes at Quilt University, a now defunct dot com. This was the result of that first dyeing class. I don't know exactly when I started working on or finished the top. I do know it is hand pieced and hand appliqued. I expect the two panels, the quarter inch yellow border and the final black border were sewed on by machine. The circle star in the middle was intended to be a color wheel reference for my sewing room; more a wall hanging than a tool. This quilt top lay dormant for many years, I just plain didn't know how I was going to finish it.
That was the beginning of the century, this is March 2024. Sometime in the last six years, probably after COVID and return to normal life, I put it on Phoebe and started quilting. It's possible that was last year at this time while Phoebe and frame were still up in the family room. We started on work to make the cellar into a studio for me mostly, and it has taken most of last summer until just a few weeks ago to get this place in order. Now, realistically, this is still a cellar, it looks like a cellar and it feels like a cellar, but I love this space anyway.
Back to the quilt. I put the quilt back on the frame and realized I had very little work left to do on it, so I began. Now, not being at Phoebe for a while, I was out of practice, but determined to finish it up anyway. I didn't realize how out of practice I was. I was working on a free motion border of feathers. Thinking I knew how to do that, easy peasy, I actually had lost my feather skills that I had built up. Yikes! and because of that, I simply decided to plunge on as if I knew what I was doing. But because of my ineptness, I decided to return to free motion quilting (FMQ) on my Juki to finish up the two panels. Because I had quilted a table runner using FMQ, I was a little more practiced and really enjoyed the return to FMQ.
Quilting finished, I needed a binding. Black and white gingham seemed perfect. And to me, it is. Now, some of the hand dyed fabric ran sometime through the years. So when I washed it, I threw some color catchers in it the quilt. I hung it on the line to dry and brought it in last night. I sat in the living room under it to warm up and, although a little small, I slept under it last light. So, for a long journey and a ton of mishaps, I love my new finished little quilt. Very proud that it finally got finished!
