The Swamp Quilt
YAY!!! HORRAY! I finished a quilt top! I even put together the backing! Now this quilt is ready to be delivered to mom for quilting. One New Year's Resolution down, two to go! Yay!
I consider this my very first quilt. When I began this project about five or six years ago, Mom had opened her shop the month before with a promotional block-a-month program. I can't exactly remember how it went? Maybe people paid $5 for the first block, and if they brought that block in completed, then the next block was free. The idea was to get people coming into the store at least once a month. Then we'd have demonstrations that morning as we handed out the new blocks. The second block of this program was this combination Snowball and Nine-Patch square. I made the block, and was thrilled with my success. Then the magical swamp fabric came in, and I instantly fell in love with it. Since the Snowball & Nine-Patch block was the only one I knew how to make at the time, the combination of this fabric and that quilt block seemed perfect! Actually I think they were, because the effect of the darker nine-patch is to create little windows, port holes, into the lighter fabric.
More than any of my other quilts, this quilt shows my progression as a quilter. Every square has at least one mistake. I'm glad for these mistakes though because I had to make them before I could move on. I learned on this quilt about making points and seams match up. When I first began working on these blocks, the idea of getting the corners just right had never occurred to me. Many of the blocks are very irregular. I also learned that it was better to take my time and get a neat looking block rather than to hurry-up-and-finish because my hurry-up-and-finish meant a sloppy quilt. When I began making the snowballs, I didn't take the time to draw lines on the back of each corner square. I foolishly believed that I could just eyeball a diagonal line. Despite all of the mistakes, I like the overall effect of the quilt.
The Swamp Quilt is actually called a the Midsummer Night's Dream Quilt (which is just too much to say thus the nickname). A friend who used the same fabric in a quilt called her quilt Brigadoon. The green print has that feel to it, as though at any moment something magical will happen in that place. I still love the swamp fabric, and in fact all of the fabrics I used for this quilt. The swamp fabric is a Hoffman print, and the red at the center of ever Nine-Patch is actually a Cocheco print.
For the backing I ended up needing to add an extra fabric, so I took the Navy batik that borders the top and will be the binding, and put a stripe of that down the middle of the pale green backing.
I tried to get the color on the pale green to come out right, but my camera/computer wants to read the pale green as off white or gray.
Now it is back to trying to make clothes. I'm glad that I finished that quilt. It gave me a real boost of confidence! See, I do finish projects every once in a while!
I consider this my very first quilt. When I began this project about five or six years ago, Mom had opened her shop the month before with a promotional block-a-month program. I can't exactly remember how it went? Maybe people paid $5 for the first block, and if they brought that block in completed, then the next block was free. The idea was to get people coming into the store at least once a month. Then we'd have demonstrations that morning as we handed out the new blocks. The second block of this program was this combination Snowball and Nine-Patch square. I made the block, and was thrilled with my success. Then the magical swamp fabric came in, and I instantly fell in love with it. Since the Snowball & Nine-Patch block was the only one I knew how to make at the time, the combination of this fabric and that quilt block seemed perfect! Actually I think they were, because the effect of the darker nine-patch is to create little windows, port holes, into the lighter fabric.
More than any of my other quilts, this quilt shows my progression as a quilter. Every square has at least one mistake. I'm glad for these mistakes though because I had to make them before I could move on. I learned on this quilt about making points and seams match up. When I first began working on these blocks, the idea of getting the corners just right had never occurred to me. Many of the blocks are very irregular. I also learned that it was better to take my time and get a neat looking block rather than to hurry-up-and-finish because my hurry-up-and-finish meant a sloppy quilt. When I began making the snowballs, I didn't take the time to draw lines on the back of each corner square. I foolishly believed that I could just eyeball a diagonal line. Despite all of the mistakes, I like the overall effect of the quilt.
The Swamp Quilt is actually called a the Midsummer Night's Dream Quilt (which is just too much to say thus the nickname). A friend who used the same fabric in a quilt called her quilt Brigadoon. The green print has that feel to it, as though at any moment something magical will happen in that place. I still love the swamp fabric, and in fact all of the fabrics I used for this quilt. The swamp fabric is a Hoffman print, and the red at the center of ever Nine-Patch is actually a Cocheco print.
For the backing I ended up needing to add an extra fabric, so I took the Navy batik that borders the top and will be the binding, and put a stripe of that down the middle of the pale green backing.
I tried to get the color on the pale green to come out right, but my camera/computer wants to read the pale green as off white or gray.
Now it is back to trying to make clothes. I'm glad that I finished that quilt. It gave me a real boost of confidence! See, I do finish projects every once in a while!
posted by LNLisa at 7:28 AM
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