Thanksgiving Break, Part One

So after being scolded on all fronts for not updating the blog I am going to make a concerted effort to catch up on the progress of the Märchen quilt.

To begin with, it seems as though I didn't take a single picture over my Thanksgiving break of the quilt in progress. Not once. I know I grabbed my camera because Opus (one of two cats that are nominally 'mine') was playing with some fabric but in true feline fashion she instantly grew tired of the game the moment a camera entered the area. So unfortunately you'll have to make do with pictures in my dorm room of the quilt.



Since I had essentially the whole of Thanksgiving break to work on the quilt I made a ton of progress. Remember when I just had a pile of these?

Remember kids, don't drink and quilt!

Well, in the course of a little under a week I turned boring squares into this:

Yeah. I had a lot of time on my hands.

It's not finished of course; I'm still chugging along with the quilting and then there's the binding, but beyond that the basic nature of the quilt is complete. I'm actually surprisingly happy with how well it turned out, especially since I had a lot of doubts about its coherency before I got the top all sewed together.

The border is a lovely nature themed print from Joann's Fabrics. Thanks
to my sister, it actually works with the quilt!

The border is what saves it from being obnoxiously busy; there's just so much going on in the quilt that the eye really needs a place to rest and relax, and while the white helps I think it's the border that really calms the quilt down.

Close up of one of the "big" blocks.

The quilt is also my attempt at making a "standard" sized quilt. It was made to perfectly fit the batting, and I don't think I'll ever make that mistake again. I don't know if I'm just bad at it (entirely possible), if I'm doing it wrong (highly likely), or if there's something else going on, but the batting and backing managed to get rumpled even though I spent a good hour smoothing everything out. Part of the problem is that I didn't have anywhere to really spread it out without stepping on the fool thing. I wound up having to go through two rooms each time I wanted to work on the other end because it filled the room! It's a full size, which while a step down from the queen sized quilt I hoped to make it will suit my needs nicely.

The backing was my version of a Black Friday steal: Joann's
had these lovely cotton solids on sale for 1.99 a yard. Compared
to 4.99 a yard for muslin, how could I resist the chance to try
a colored backing?

The backing was interesting: I did all the calculations myself (a dodgy proposition at the best of times), and got exactly as much backing fabric as I needed and no more. I wound up having to do some sketchy cuts and fittings, but it wound up covering the back of the quilt perfectly. Yay! I also gave in to temptation and bought some solids for my next project, but I'll save those for the next part.

The quilting.

And here's where I'm torn. I like the idea of the contrasting blue thread for the quilting, but I love the peacefulness the white brings to the quilt. I think I might try white thread on top, and blue in the bobbin, and tear out all the quilting I've done so far. It'll set me back a little in progress, but I think it'll look better nonetheless.

That's it for now. Check back tomorrow or so for part two!