Friday, January 24, 2014

Getting my stitch together

Last Saturday, I posted this picture to my Instagramwith the caption: 
"finally found the perfect grey to complete my quilt! It's a birthday miracle."


That may seem like I'm over-selling it, but truly, that grey was the crux of everything, and finally finding the color I had in my mind's eye pushed me from the planning stages into the production phase. Monday was a holiday in honor of my birthday (or maybe even something more momentous…) and daycare was open so I was kid free, so I got to spend the entire day making my quilt dreams into quilt realities. (I had already spent a couple nights cutting out all of my pieces, so the day was spent sewing line after line after line after line. With some breaks mixed in for leftover cake. Obviously.)


I'm happy to report that I now have a 100% finished back, and a 90% finished front. We've got one week left in the challenge though, and it's going to be a bit of a push to finish by the deadline. All that remains of the piecing stage is one final stripe (I was waiting to determine the final size of the quilt so I knew how wide to make that last strip…) and cutting off the excess on my sides (in order to get the stripes to line up- or not line up, purposely- the way I like, the sides are all jagged. I made them extra long with this in mind though, so I just have to square up the full finished panel).


Then it's time to quilt. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to run this giant thing through my regular machine (it's twin bed size- roughly 69"x90") so I may have to call in the big guns and take advantage of some local quilt hookups (meaning- a coworker's grandma's long arm machine. Yeah!) Then some binding and we'll be ready to snuggle. I do have to say: it's turning out pretty awesome. I may not finish until January 2015, but I love it so much that it's worth the effort. I think…


Calling all Stitch It Together Participants…How's it going? Are you working your frozen fingers to the bone? Or did you take too many cake breaks and swear off sewing until the Spring thaw? 

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