Sunday, April 25, 2010

My First quilt - King sized!



I began this quilt in the 1980's .. I went to a sampler class when I lived in Perth, and instead of making just one block ...I did 2 of the same in different colours.
The lace in the Grandmothers Fan blocks belonged to my Grandmother..and the pink and the pale teal fabric is from the sheets we had when we first married - nearly 50 years ago.
I cut the sashing..and forgot to wash to wash the fabric first...it runs ... very badly....so I put the blocks away in a chest for another 10 years...and when I moved to the country in the hills above Perth, I made a very special friend of Liz, and I have mentioned in an erlier post that without her, I would not have been on this journey...
Anyhow, I managed to sew it together with her help and encouragement, and marked - very heavily in pencil! -all the designs,  after first drawing and cutting my own stencisll....I burnt them with a hot knife...difficult.
This is all hand quilted - I really thought that was how I had to do all the quilting.  
Well... I finished the hand quilting last year! and the binding is still not on...but we sleep very warmly under it :)


The back of the quilt.
Very heavily quilted as it was a wool batting.
As this quilt had taken sooo long...I decided there must be quicker ways to do this.  Hence I have been learning to do machine quilting.,
I have made a few quilts now, but never FMQ ...and I now prefer to sandwich the quilts and put the designs on afterwards...also time consuming.  
I tried various methods one of which I used in the quilt below. 


Called 'From My Heart to Yours', this is a quilt I made for Andrea in 2003.  All machine quilted...and also not marked before it was put together.  I machined the designs onto  a heap of tear away fabirc with the sewing machine - needle and no thread, then threaded with the cotton I sewed each design with a separate 'block' of the tearawy fabric. ...and long strips of the tear-away for the borders. That was easier than the pencil


A different view of the quilting on Andfrea's quilt.

More later...I am trying to get a video up af me quilting the border fo my Prism Quilt....but not having much luck getting it from the camera to the computer.

Oh - I had more bad luck last night.  Silly me wasnt watching the edges of the quilt when I was quilting, and of course - I sewed some of the edge bits onto the patterned area...so unpicking is in progress...not easy!
But a lesson hard learnt!

More of my story later

18 comments:

  1. Your hand quilted is quite beautiful! I envy you being able to do that. Especially as detailed as it is.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The quilt is one you'll treasure for the hand quilting. I love hearing the stories that go with the quilts. You have tenacity but then you must love it. I'd love to see a video, hope you can get it going.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Both such stunning quilts!! You are so talented!!
    Good luck with the video. ♥

    ReplyDelete
  4. Joan, what a story this is. I'm so glad you've shared this beautiful work and the effort that went into it. As Janet says - you have tenacity! Love that about you. Would like to have that within me. Still, I'll watch from here and hopefully catch come of that by osmosis. :)

    The quilt you made for Andrea is so sweet and beautiful and cozy. I absolutely enjoy you and your blog.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Sooo beautiful! You do fantastic work. I think you must be very patient, and the quilt is stunning.
    Regards from the other side of the world :-)

    ReplyDelete
  6. I love reading how you approach your quilting. The amount of quilting you did on the Sampler quilt is awesome!! I love the back as much as the front :0)

    Crispy

    ReplyDelete
  7. I have to say that your hand quilting is stunning and I think you will be happy you did at least one! I am incapable of sticking to anything this long an I am glad to have some wonderful machine quilters available!
    hus
    m

    ReplyDelete
  8. Both quilts are absolutely awesome. I love your work! I am also enjoying your blog, it's great. Your welcome picture with the vibrant quilt against the bright green grass and blue sky just makes my heart feel happy!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Joan your quilts are beautiful and the quilting is so fine and detailed.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Both your hand and machine quilting are beautiful. The quilts are lovely1

    ReplyDelete
  11. What a beautiful quilt! I can't believe it is your first one. The hand quilting is stunning-- definitely worth the time, I think. It is a treasure. :)

    ReplyDelete
  12. You are a stunning quilter Joan- All the meticulous work you do is amazing. I enjoy machine quilting and piecing but hand quilting does not call to me. It is enough for me to admire others intricate work. I congratulate you on completing such a beautiful work of art.
    I love your header quilt- the rich colors call to me.
    Regards from Western Canada,
    Anna
    http://quiltmomsjourney.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  13. Your quilts are beautiful and such a lot of handquilting in the first one but well worth it. It looks fantastic.

    ReplyDelete
  14. CUANDO ESTAN BIEN HECHAS LAS COSAS EL TIEMPO QUE SE HAYA TARDADO NO IMPORTA.
    BESOS

    ReplyDelete
  15. Joan, you are AMAZING! Your handquilting is phenomenal!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Just beautiful Joan..
    That's a lot of hand quilting, but it is so lovely and I'm sure one that will be treasured..
    Hope you get the video running...love to see it.
    Julia ♥

    ReplyDelete
  17. Your first quilt is lovely and such a wonderful story.

    ReplyDelete
  18. What a wonderful quilt, Joan! My very first sampler went into the wheelie bin!!! Too late now for regrets! You should be able to do a little of the binding early every morning before you get up! Just leave the needle and thread handy. If you need a coffee you could just accidently poke your dear husband and murmour how sorry you are and maybe suggest he could be lying on the needle!!!
    Thank you for the Birthday Happies - it was a great day!

    ReplyDelete

I love it when you visit and leave your comments... its very encouraging and I thank you for your time.
However please no tags or awards.

I have put comment moderation back on as I really don't enjoy spam messages...apologies to all my friends....such is life these days.