divadiversion

When I entered my quilt into the show, I also entered a couple of garments.  One of the garments was a pieced vest I did several years ago.  Initially it was going to be a long tunic.  Then I changed my mind.

Well, when the show was over and the votes for “Viewers Choice were tallied, there was a three way tie for First Place in the garments category.

My vest was one of those in the tie.  Every vote counts.  Thank you!

We all get them, you know the incentive patterns that come with the invitations to subscribe to the quilting magazines.  Some are pretty basic, others enticing, but this one I saved.  I saved it for a couple of years.  And oh yes, I did subscribe to the magazine.

The name of the free gift pattern is Now and Later.  It is beginner friendly and is a great opportunity to showcase whatever fabrics you collect.  Some of us collect a couple of things.  But it’s a good idea to start with ONE.

Most of the winter I had worked with ties, and dark and masculine colors (read brown and blue).  My collection of thirties fabrics was calling to me and of course it made this a no-brainer.  It was a joyful labor of love cutting out the fabrics.  Then with the smaller pieces I cut for a baby or dolly blanket to match.  This was probably my very favorite part of the process, handling and cutting the rectangles, and revisiting the fabrics that took me decades to collect.

I even enjoyed attaching the little white squares to the rectangles.  Truly therapeutic, mindless piecework, that after a few hours results in a nice little stack of units.

Next came putting them together as a cohesive unit.  It was fun to play with the units on the design wall.  I put them up I took them down, and repeat.  Finally, I settled on a layout.

Then it happened, I started sewing the units together, into bigger units, then rows, and more units and rows, and rows to rows.  My enthusiasm for the project began to wane, but I really wanted to get it all together before pulling it off the wall.  I persevered, and got it together.

Because there is so much handling there were threads.  Lots and lots of threads.  Grooming was a must before sending it to the quilter.

I can’t imagine any long arm quilter wanting to deal with this, or any piecer wanting to get their quilt back with this stuff quilted in.  So remember, groom your flimsy.

Initially, I was going to use my feed sacks for the backing but reconsidered and went with the same Kona white that I used in the front.

It’s all groomed and ready to be shipped to the quilter!

Oh that baby quilt, and dolly quilt, they will wait a little while as I need to shift gears.  That being said, I do see this done with florals on a lovely garden green background.  Maybe with bigger pieces.

It had been a long long time since I had been asked how much I charged for a quilt.  Honestly, I didn’t have a very good answer…in fact I had no answer other than “I’m not sure”.  The man wanted a quilt for his six year old granddaughter.  Something girly and a more grown up than a baby quilt but he didn’t want to spend a lot of money.  I mean she is a six year old right.  His only request was that “Sweet Pea” be on the quilt and if I could fit it on, the little girls name; Garbyella.

Truth be told, I had been working on some tedious stuff and was looking for a project that provided me with a sense of accomplishment.  And a chance to work with some FUN fabrics.   Gramps had been doing some work on the house and I wanted to keep the cost down.  I went through my juvenile and novelties stash and came up with a fair amount, but not quite enough.  So there was an opportunity to shop, and I did.  It was fun as I had discovered a couple of new to me quilt shops in my area as I’ve only been here about a year.

It wasn’t long before I had fabrics up on the design wall and the lettering done for her name and nickname.  That was a new thing for me to do!

The quilt went together fairly quickly as I needed to keep it simple.  I’m calling it an “entry level” quilt.  My quilter, Terry Burris Quilting was able to turn it around for me quickly.  And with some of the scraps I was able to make a pillow case.

There was still one more thing I wanted to do.  Part of the reason Gabryella was getting a new quilt was to stop dragging around her old one.  So I went the next step and made one for her dolly so she would still have something to take with her.

Her baby dolls name is Mya.  The backing of the baby doll quilt is the same that I used on the twin quilt and the pillowcase.

This was just the distraction I needed to feel a sense of accomplishment!  So what do you tell people when they ask, “How much do you charge for a quilt?”