Big Things Ahead

Now that the small things are done - little sweaters and  baby blankets all delivered. One baby safely arrived, two more are imminent. The hand quilted panel baby quilt is finished and waiting for the baby. I really found that I enjoyed the hand stitching versus sitting tied to the sewing machine. Yes, it did take longer and No, my stitches were not perfect, but I found it very relaxing and spread it over a couple of weeks.

This little project was so much fun to do that I have decided to take on a much larger venture. Go big or go home, right? Next up, a queen size quilt that I will hand stitch into the design on this fabric.

I started looking for other projects like this online and eventually found some on Pinterest. Although this is not what is technically referred to as a "whole cloth quilt", I am not sure what else to call it. It is whole fabric and I am quilting it. I will join two panels of this 45" fabric - a queen size quilt bat - and a backing fabric and will quilt the shapes that are in the fabric (instead of piecing). I will do the stitching in a "long stitch" method with the Perle Cotton.

There are lots of natural valleys and shapes in here that I think will make it lovely too look at but also interesting to quilt. It will take a lot of weeks, since I think the queen size is something like 85" by 90". About four times the size of a baby quilt. But I LOVE the fabric and hopefully still will by the time I am done.

The other Big Thing in the planning stages is a hooked headboard for one of the guest rooms. I will reveal more about it in future posts. It will need to share the calendar with the quilt, so no speedy progress on either. But they will provide lovely distractions from one another.

In the meantime, off to Belleville on Sunday to teach a Borders class at Loyalist College in the Summer Arts Program.  All the students will be bringing something for which they will design a border - or perhaps multiples. This "in progress" piece will be my demo to use in class.

I will be designing a different border for each of the four sides and hopefully have a bit of each hooked for class. And this will eventually be a pillow to go with the hand quilted 'future queen' above.