A Finish for a Friend

Life with God is not immunity from difficulties, but peace within difficulties.

~ C.S. Lewis

Quilting

The quilt is finished and gifted to a young man who's been waiting patiently a couple of years. The design looks masculine to me and blue is his favorite color. About a quarter of the squares are still scrap squares but the rest was pulled from my stash. 

Postage Stamp quilt with blues

I wanted the back to reflect his love of blues so pulled more yardage from my stash. The largest dark blue is a yard printed with boat-making blueprints. The rest of the navies are quarter yards that have been lurking around for a few years. On the left are several white fat quarters that continue the marine theme. More ships, crabs, and lighthouses. It was hard to pull them because they were intended for a different quilt... that has never been completed. 

The light blue is a remnant from the Shadow Star quilt back. It's long enough to join the different sections and reprises the back from a previous baby quilt. I like the way it outlines the different fabrics but I kind of wish the middle strip was as narrow as some of the others. I just used what I had. 

Back of Postage Stamp quilt with Blues

The blue and white stripe was chosen to bind the quilt. I thought about using some leftover binding strips but decided a single print here adds more cohesion. {Something this quilt could use.}

Postage Stamp quilt with Blues detail

A final view of the quilt.

Quilt Specifics

Size: 60" x 72"

Design: Scrappy Trip Around the World

Batting: Hobbs Heirloom Premium Natural Cotton

Thread: Aurifil blue cotton thread

Quilting: walking foot grid

Approximate yardage: 13.5 yds

Reading

I just finished the second Baby Ganesh mystery by Vaseem Khan and enjoyed the development of the characters. The Koh-i-noor diamond is stolen from a Mumbai museum while Inspector Chopra and his wife are in the room. With both India and the UK determined to recover it, Chopra and Baby Gansesh are drawn into the mystery.

PS: This wasn't my final view of this quilt. My son sent a photo of the quilt with its new owner. Utter joy for a maker to see how the recipient appreciates the work.

Enjoy the day, Ann

Quilting and Museums

It's been very busy around here the last few weeks. Occasionally there are a few moments to quilt. I'm quilting Trip Around the Block on my Bernina

Machine quilting Trip Around the Block

and hand sewing the binding of Postage Stamp during the news. I feel very efficient!

Ready to hand sew the binding on this Postage Stamp

Most of the time, however, we've been traveling or hosting friends at home. Spring is a glorious time to travel in Texas. The weather is mild and beautiful wildflowers bank all the hillsides. We drove to Dallas for the IPv6 conference and enjoyed early views of bluebonnets, Indian blanket and butterfly weed.

The Menil Museum has two Magritte exhibits, both ending in June, while the Museum of Natural Science is exhibiting an original edition of the Magna Carta, Faberge and a very interesting series of gemstone carvings by Harold van Pelt. They are all wonderful; well worth the time.

Fret not; enjoy the day.
Ann

Postage Stamp Quilt

Scrappy Trip was ready for quilting but there were only king-size batts in the closet. So I chose to first finish this Postage Stamp top I made several years ago and then use the leftover batting for the Trip.

Postage Stamp top

It's made of 2.5 inch strips, about half of them are batik. You can tell I used every scrap; some of the squares are pieced in order to have enough for the quilt. Quilted with grey 50/2 cotton Aurifil, backed with an older Northcott stripe I had on hand. Mountain Mist Cotton Blossom (a cotton/silk blend) batt.

The center is a simple diagonal grid but the batik stripe in the border needed something different. For that section, I used Leah Day's Pebbles in a Stream but quilted at a larger scale more in keeping with the rest of the quilt.

Pebbles in a Stream

Fret not; enjoy the day.

Ann