Top is Done!!!

I guess in quilting hours, I did pretty well getting this all pieced together. And I am pretty pleased with the results.

I do see things in there that I doubt others will notice, but that is human nature to focus on the little errors because you are the one who made them. Not all my triangles were exactly the same size, so some of my squares are a bit wonky and my finished size is a bit smaller - I think from trimming everything at each stage.  And despite my best efforts, there are a few places where there are colour matches or clusters.

That said, if it were all perfect, it would look like it was made by a machine, right? Not an excited Grandma-to-Be. I am sure a more precise person would have achieved a crisper outcome, but at the end of the exercise, there will be hours and hours of love put into a wonderful homemade keepsake.

It's interesting that before embarking on this exercise, in my mind I had decided that it was less time-intensive than a rug hooking project. Now I am not so sure. I think the heavy lifting of the piecing is over, but there are hours and hours of hand-quilting yet to come and then the finishing.

If I were to hook a project that was 40 x 40 and dedicate the same hours to it, I wonder if it would be done in less or more time? I may just have to challenge myself to find out, but not right now.

Next week - or the week after, since we have incoming next week - I will build my quilt "sandwich" and get it ready to start quilting. There are notes on the Purl Bee instructions page that warn the novice hand quilter that there are many layers of fabric in the ditches and it is not a notive project. I am thinking I will move slightly away from the ditch and follow the squares - see what happens. Trial and error ahead.

I think I will use my cheticamp frame and keep it set up in the studio so I can do a little bit whenever I have a little time. My goal is to have it all finished in a couple more weeks.Let's just see how that goes.