-Brendan Francis
I don't have much progress to report on my first Snowball Quilt.
Here is the back of the quilt with all those teeny tiny corners I saved and sewed together into scrappy baby snowball blocks. It turned out pretty fun, but for a while there I was worried that it wasn't going to work out. They didn't actually look like snowballs until they were all sewn in.
I've got it mostly pinned for quilting. Just over half-way through I ran out of curved basting pins, so I sorted through my regular safety pins and pulled out all the ones that were the same size as the basing pins. That got me a little over half of what I needed, so then I pulled the next size down out and they worked without much trouble. But I still have a corner and one side of the border that need pinned and I'm not to keen on the idea of using the itty bitty pins that are left to finish the job. I'm hearing shouts of, just go buy more pins! Normally I would, but there are budget constraints so I'm hoping to make this work with what I have. I think that this corner is stable enough that if I start working on the opposite side I can use the pins that come out of that side to finish pinning.
I wanted to have it quilted and bound by now. The last word I heard was that my sister's wedding shower was today, but when I talked to my mom to confirm, she told me it wasn't until next week, so I let my lack of pins and cowardice take the reigns on this project. I have planned for this quilt {free motion} stippling, but I've only practiced it a little bit and it is pretty craptastic. I know I'll get better with practice, but I hate for a quilt that is a gift to be my practice piece. I've been picturing making lovely rounded stipples in my head all week long, hoping that visualization will get me there, but the only thing for it is to just do it.
7 comments:
Elizabeth, stippling is really very forgiving, and your snowball quilt is so bright and cheery that every one will be focusing on the pieced design rather than the stippling. You'll do fine.
Me? I gave a quilt to a friend in which, yeah if I looked at each individual flaw, the FMQ was pretty craptastic too. And I didn't have the sense to do stippling first--no I had to try my own design. You may remember: http://thedesertquilter.blogspot.com/2010/06/another-wip-bites-dust.html Even on this quilt where the errors are far more obvious than they will be on stippling, the overall look is still nice.
Go for it girlfriend! :-)
I only have 2 craptastic stippled table runners under my belt so far, but the second one was definitely less anxiety-inducing than the first. And after you do it and leave it for a day or so and look at it again, you'll think, wow, that's not bad!
[Remind me of this when I have my little freak-out before the next quilt I stipple, would ya?] :)
I like the baby snowballs on the back! Those colors are very pretty together.
Oh you sound just like me. From the pins to the thoughts about quilting the quilt. I'm glad I came across your blog today, it encourages me to continue with my current projects.
PS Love the little snowballs on the back. What a good idea. They will love the gift!
love love love the snowballs in the back! adding extra blocks into my quilt backings have become a real favorite for me right now; love the look of it.
instead of stippling the quilt, what about wavy straight lines?
E - this is just gorgeous. Close your eyes and start to stipple. If you jump I'll jump.
Like everyone else I think adding mini snowballs to the back was pure genius!
awesome idea! I just wanted to add that the colors of this quilt look even way better in person--it was so much fun to see this in the making on your living room floor! xoxo
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