Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Finally Finished! Tidepools in Island Batik

Hurrah for a finish!  I've had this basted for several months and ready to quilt, but no inspiration for the actual quilting design.  I didn't really want to do an allover design on it, but had no clue how I did want to quilt it.  When I got that box of quilting goodies from my mom, it included a package of stencils and the the block stencil was perfect.  I thought it would be a great challenge to try quilting this by machine and I was right!

The first challenge was marking it!  White was too light in the background.  Blue didn't show in the medium blues.  Finally I ended up with a pink chalk pencil.  I was glad there were only 5 blocks in this quilt to do because it was a bit tedious to mark each block.  Then the process of quilting was a bit tricky as well.  I kept losing the flow of how to move from one loop to the next in the center.  I also struggled with some breaking thread and skipped stitches when moving from 11:00 to 12:00 in a circle.  I'm pretty sure part of the issue is that my blocks are on point.  It really seems like I struggle whenever I do a quilt that is on point, particularly if it is a batik.  I'll have to research this more.

When I finished the blocks, I looked on Pinterest for some ideas for the flying geese sashing.  I found an idea I liked and went to work on those.   I used curved outlining on the triangles and a herringbone loop on the geese and squares.

Next were the sashing squares.  Well, I attempted to use a curved ruler with mixed results.  Some times I got nice arcs, but most had a wobble or two.
They aren't perfect, but I think I'll just accept this quilt as it is with it's imperfections.  The next decision was what to do with the large setting triangles.  Hmmm.  I remembered seeing a wavy crosshatch on a quilt and thought I would give that a try!  Loved how that came out, other than all the stops and starts to deal with.
At this point I was ready to be done, but still had to deal with two borders.  The inner one was easy, I just did a large spiral all the way around.  For the outer border I thought about trying to trace the sunflower design in the fabric, but decided to do overlapped circles in the end.  I managed to run out of medium blue thread about 3/4 of the way around the quilt.  So the last part got quilted in a slightly lighter shade.  You can hardly tell, and I'll just say it adds to the charm!  At least it is finally finished - making it a good week of quilting.  This quilt measures 59 x 59.  It is made with Island batik fabrics on the top and a pretty cotton on the back that looks like water.  It is quilted with a combination of Aurifil threads in 40 and 50 weights.  The batting is Warm and Natural.  I think it will make a lovely lap quilt for someone!


Available in my Etsy Shop.

This and the rest of my lap and bed quilts will be 25% off to celebrate my baby girl's college graduation for the next month.  No coupon code needed, sale items will be clearly marked!

I've linked up on Connie's blog here for Linky Party Tuesday!

1 comment:

JanineMarie said...

First of all, congrats on your daughter's graduation. Such a milestone! Your quilt is a lovely shade of blue. Thanks for sharing your approach to quilting the different parts of the quilt. I'm really intrigued by the wavy crosshatch. I, too, have trouble with some directions in FMQ--I'm finding now that my favorite way of working is to quilt away from myself, pulling the quilt toward me. I can see where I've been and I don't seem to put as much drag on it.