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| "Sugar Shack Leaves," 51" x 51", completed in 2006 |
The pattern for the leaf blocks came from Quilter's Newsletter Magazine Issue 357, "Shelly's Swirling Leaves, but I changed the borders. I wanted to evoke the feeling of laying on our backs on that Vermont mountainside outside the sugar shack, surrounded by the forest at peak foliage season, with those brightly colored leaves floating down from a clear blue sky. My version of the quilt was published in the Quilting Bee section of QN Issue 397, November 2007.
This was my third completed quilt, my first attempt at hand stitched applique (for the leaf stems), and my first and only hand quilted quilt. It's only a throw sized quilt, but my boys were little at that time and I was only able to work on it in small snatches of time here and there so it took me about two years from start to finish. Here you can see a much younger, exhausted version of myself working on the hand quilting back in 2005:
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| Hand Quilting In Progress, back in December 2005 |
How time flies! That photo was taken in my in-laws' motor coach after we had spent the entire day in Disney World with toddlers. Hence the dark circles under my eyes, general exhaustion, and "Really? You need to take my picture NOW?!" look on my face. But it's kind of neat now to have an "in progress" shot to share. I'm using my square Grace lap hoop and my Roxanne thimble.
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| Hand Quilting Detail |
This quilt wasn't really the best choice for showing off hand quilting. You can't even see it unless you look up close, and my little random leaves quilted in the background look pretty lame to me now. But it was relaxing hand work and I did enjoy it. Maybe if I ever get around to setting my Jingle applique blocks, that one might be a good candidate for some hand quilting.
One more shot to share -- the machine embroidered quilt label:
That's it for today. I'm linking up with Val's Tuesday Archives linky. Have a great day!
One more shot to share -- the machine embroidered quilt label:
That's it for today. I'm linking up with Val's Tuesday Archives linky. Have a great day!
thanks for posting this - what a wonderful leaf quilt and you hand quilted it!! you should be proud!
ReplyDeleteI like your quilt a lot. Changing up the size of the leaf blocks adds a nice dimsnsion to it. And I don't know what the border was "supposed{ to be, but I like what you changed t to. Claire
ReplyDeleteThanks, Claire. The original pattern had a sawtooth border with one plain, narrower outer border. I changed the sawtooth to a wider square in a square (or whatever that's called) and made the outer border a lot wider to show off that print fabric that looked like fall foliage.
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ReplyDeletethat is amazing hand quilting! And pretty quilt which matches what I am seeing out my window.
We also ventured to Disneyland with 2 children under 5 so I was amused by your photo!