Lenten Twelves 2021 : Gilded Edges

Sometimes I can’t decide which I like more: the thrill and excitement of an experiment or the confidence of a sure thing. Experiments are full of possibilities, potential breakthroughs, innovative ideas. They also come with nervousness, the chance of failure, and many pauses for consideration. Tried and true methods, on the other hand, can be carried out with speed and confidence. Also, lest we forget, tried and true methods are not always boring or lacking in innovation; sometimes they are the successes born of experiments that have been perfected into common practice.

Experiment : Gold Screen Printing

This week I picked up gold screen printing ink (experiment #1).

I have never printed with metallic before, but I have sketched and imagined the possibilities since visiting Prague and being inspired by the minimal gold accents adorning their many stone sculptures. A gold zucchetto graces a sandstone cleric blackened by pollution. A gilded halo floats above a blackened angel on the famous Charles Bridge. Saint Elizabeth wields a golden scepter over the tourists and locals.

Unfortunately, my local art shop was out of the small jars of gold textile screen printing ink. Not wanting to wait, I opted to dive in to this experiment with acrylic ink (experiment #2). The ink was silky smooth to print with (although I can’t be sure the texture difference between the acrylic gold ink and my textile ink isn’t age-related rather than substrate-related).

Results: beautiful gold printing

I still want to experiment with the gold ink more to really grasp its versatility and uses, but so far, I would consider it a success. Due to its metallic nature, the gold ink looks darker from some angles and lighter and more subtle from others. I would be curious to see how it plays off darker fabrics.

Experiment : Canvas-mounted Quilt

This is something I regularly wrestle with as I create wall quilts: how can an art quilt be easily and masterfully hung? There are several methods for finishing the edges of a quilt other than traditional binding, and I hope to work on a tutorial series covering some of these methods. However, no matter how you finish the edges of the art quilt, you are still left deciding how to hang it on the wall. I have used velcro. I have used dowels. I have hand-sewed individual quilt squares to a piece of mat board. None of these methods have satisfied my desire for a method that elevates the quilt to the crisp finish of modern art without requiring painstaking care and copious amounts of fiddly hand-sewing.

This week, I planned to try wrapping my finished quilt around a pre-made canvas (experiment #3). I added a border to the original composition in order to provide extra fabric for wrapping. Then, after printing on the quilt, I realized I had calculated the margin wrong and added more. I also cut my batting in a cross shape so that there would be no bulky batting to fold around the corners of the canvas.

Results : trying French cleats next

After all this thought-filled preparation, when it came time to wrap the quilt around the canvas, I realized that I liked the quilt composition better with the borders that I had added (borders that would be lost to the edges and back of the canvas). Not to mention, I love how the gold printing is cropped by the outermost border. With this in mind, I padded upstairs to discuss the predicament with my partner and resident art-hanging expert. As a gallery director and once-art-museum-preparator, my husband is a treasure trove of expertise and talent when it comes to hanging artwork.

After some discussion, he suggested I mount the quilt on a 1/4” piece of plywood and then use French cleats on the back to float it in a frame. Enthused by this new idea (experiment #4), we drove to the store to get some MDF, short screws, and short staples. We don’t own a table saw, so my husband will cut the board and French cleats for me when he’s at work tomorrow. I am excited and hopeful that this system might provide a straight-forward and professional system for mounting and framing my art quilts. Stay tuned!

Lenten Twelves 2021

Follow the links below to read more about this quilt series or check out #LentenTwelves and #LentenTwelves2021 on Instagram. Curious what “Lenten Twelves” are? Check out this introductory post: Lenten Twelves: a Creative Practice.

Flitting Quilt Pattern

To celebrate my new quilting fabric collection, Coastal Orchards for Benartex, I designed a free quilt pattern! It is called Flitting.

Inspiration

Flitting was inspired by the swooping of butterflies as they flutter through orchards and gardens. When photographing a butterfly in flight, it is almost impossible to get a crisp shot that showcases the butterfly’s wings. Instead each snapshot captures the butterfly at a different angle with their wings at different levels of extension. This quilt represents that beautiful but erratic flight.

Difficulty Level: Beginner

This quilt pattern is definitely beginner-friendly but offers a finished product that looks more difficult than it is.

Confession: The hardest part for me was remembering which of my light-colored fabrics corresponded to which fabric in the pattern. That’s why in the pattern I suggest creating a cheat sheet for yourself!

Block Highlight: Hourglass Block

This quilt introduces the hourglass block (also sometimes referred to as the quarter-square triangle), and it is one of my favorite blocks. I love how easy it is to make four hourglass blocks at once, and I enjoy playing with how much white fills each block. Check out my Hourglass Block Tutorial to see pictures and read tips.

Click Here to Download Flitting Quilt Pattern File

I’m working on my sample for the quilt, so check back next week to see a finished Flitting Quilt or

follow along on Instagram at #LovELyFlittingQuilt

Black and White Deconstructed Quilt Finished

Quilt: Lenten Twelves Three

Watching: Season Two of Blue Bloods

Favorite Part of Quilt: diagonal straight-line quilting in just the grey areas

Place for Improvement: experimenting with the connective quilting after rearranging

To read more about this Lenten Twelves series, follow the links below:

Introduction to Lenten Twelves

Printing Stripes on Quilts

Citrus Printing onto Lenten Twelve Two

New screen!!! I designed a new citrus pattern and made a screen of the one-color version to print on quilts. I love it!! I am so thankful that I have the resources at the College of Textiles to put patterns on acetate and then burn them onto screens. 

With new screen in hand, I printed a translucent white onto my springy mini quilt.

Then I free-motion quilted around a trailing path of fruits and leaves and finished off the background with scattered aqua straight-line quilting. I love how it is turning out! I will definitely be trying more of these this summer. Next up is chopping this quilt into teeny minis and then finishing them with my serger!

To read more about this Lenten Twelves series, follow the links below:

Introduction to Lenten Twelves

Lenten Twelves One Progress (beginning)

Lenten Twelves Two Progress (beginning)

Printing Stripes on Quilts

Printing Stripes on Quilts

I have a new screen! It's a 12" x 12" square of graphic lines, and I love it! I masked out the bottom so that it would line up perfectly with two seams in my mustard Lenten Twelves One. Although I think my printing ink should've been a bit thinner to get in the crevices better, I like the overall effect, and I am excited to try it on more quilts!

Right after printing Lenten Twelve One, I ironed this grey guy flat onto the printing board and printed him too! It is so fun to add movement with such a graphic statement atop a quilt. 

I didn't really mean for the second set of lines to perfectly align with the center of the quilt, but oh well! When you're sketching, sometimes your pencil lines don't quite go where you meant. When you're quilt sketching, I think the same is true.

Seeing my collection of Lenten Twelves grow this year has been fun. I feel like I am stretching my creative boundaries with these quilt sketches, and I am having a last in the process!

To read more about this Lenten Twelves series, follow the links below:

Introduction to Lenten Twelves

Lenten Twelves One Progress (beginning)

Lenten Twelves Two Progress (beginning)

Lenten Twelves One Finished

Lenten Twelves Two Progress

This week's Lenten Twelve was a creative block. It wasn't the kind of block that hinders all ideas completely. It was the kind where one idea fills your mind so much that you can't think of anything else.

Every Wednesday night, I eat dinner and sew with a group of ladies from my church. It is home away from home, and I look forward to that restful and creative time of fellowship. A couple weeks ago, we started making quick quarter-square-triangles (QSTs) out of scraps for a quilt to donate. I LOVE QSTs. And this method is so easy and fast! (I will be sharing a tutorial soon.)

After that, I could not stop thinking about QSTs in my favorite springy colors. Every time I tried to brainstorm a Lenten Twelve. Springy QSTs springy QSTs springy QSTs. So here they are! This block too will be overprinted in the next couple weeks. Check back to see some printed progress!

To read more about this Lenten Twelves series, follow the links below:

Introduction to Lenten Twelves

Lenten Twelves One Progress

Lenten Twelves One Progress

My goal for each week of Lent is simply a quilt top. Designing, piecing, printing, quilting, and binding a mini quilt each week felt daunting! Especially considering I am traveling or busy every weekend of Lent but one. Do not get me wrong. I would not give up my weekend events: a retreat in the mountains, a Michigan wedding, and a conference on communicating science. However, to keep life sane, I decided to set reasonable expectations for myself this Lent. Piecing (and hopefully printing), a top each week feels manageable.

Here is the top from Week One. I wanted to play with tone-on-tone and simulated transparency. The band across the middle inverts the two colors, creating interesting interactions between the shapes and colors at its borders. I particularly enjoy the mustard arrow in the second row that has one tan corner!

The screens are not quite ready for printing, but I have put the grid designs onto transparent plastic and prepped two screens for exposure. Maybe I can print this weekend!! Follow along on Instagram @LovelyandEnough to see real-time progress!

To read more about this Lenten Twelves series, follow the links below:

Introduction to Lenten Twelves

Printing Stripes on Quilts

Lenten Twelves One Finished

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Monochromatic Layers of Charm Quilt

Two years ago, the FatQuarterShop asked me to test of a new free pattern of theirs:

Layers of Charm. While I was very tempted by the prospect of new Cotton+Steel fabrics, I opted for a red flannel with black and white front. The quilt was a cinch to pull together! Just a charm pack and a layer cake and couple Saturday afternoons (more than one only because I enjoy being distracted by Netflix and such) and I had the coziest quilt ever! Did I mention that I used high loft batting for extra squish?

Well, when my sister felt my quilt, she got a little jealous and has been bugging me to make her one ever since. This fall, I walked into Joann, saw their crazy soft flannels, and knew what I'd be making my sister for Christmas. With a buttery black and white flannel in hand, I went home, ordered the precuts, and then set about sewing. So many times I thought about keeping this quilt for myself and giving my sister the original. I debated with myself about giving a "used" gift, and then I debated whether you could really call a quilt "used." In the end, I decided to be the bigger sister and give away the cozy new one. But that was just the beginning of the saga of this quilt.

The night before my early flight home, I had packed everything but the quilt. Before zipping my bag, I went to tuck the quilt in...and I couldn't find it. Anywhere. I realized that I must have left it at school because I had been hand-binding while I worked a couple days earlier. Since it was nearing midnight, I vowed to get up early and retrieve it. However, when I arrived at school, the quilt was in neither of the labs, nor my office. I double and triple checked to no avail!

Dejectedly I went back to my apartment, unpacked the needle and thread I had tucked in my backpack to finish binding on the plane and waited for my friend to pick me up for the airport. I packed up my quilt to give to my sister instead. When my friend arrived, I climbed in the car and told her the story, how I was trying so hard to remember when I'd last seen the quilt that I literally couldn't remember anything about Thursday afternoon anymore. We were part way to the airport when she asked me if I had stopped in the bathroom before headed home.

"YES!" I exclaimed. "I remember setting the quilt on the shelf in the bathroom and thinking, 'Wouldn't it be a bummer if I left it there?'" She turned around the car, racing back to school, and I found it on the shelf!! When we arrived at the airport, I unpacked my quilt from my bag and tucked my sister's inside (much easier to fit hers since I used regular batting for hers, and as you might remember I used high loft for mine).

Unfortunately, I had unpacked the thread and needle to finish the binding on the plane, but luckily (?) both of my flights were delayed. I had time to check out every news stand in the airport to find a sewing kit and then sat contentedly in multiple airports binding up a storm.

Needless to say, this quilt had quite the adventure, and as you can see below, its new owner is very happy to have received it.

See the original black, white, and red flannel quilt here.

Modern Courthouse Quilt | featuring navy Pistachios

I can't get enough of the Modern Courthouse Baby quilt pattern. This is the fourth I have made. Someone needs to stop me. The pattern is just so perfect for highlighting a hand-printed panel while maintaining a minimal aesthetic.

This little guy was happy to be my quilt model while we were hanging out one afternoon. I mean, who wouldn't rather lay on a quilt on a warm fall day than go car shopping with mom and dad? And how perfect that he was wearing such a fun citron diaper, since I didn't manage to sneak any citron into this quilt. Pudgy thighs, stylish cloth diaper, quilt to be photographed: it was a match made in quilting heaven.

Sometimes picking out binding and backing can prove tricky, but with my hand-dandy quilt consultant (aka boyfriend) along, it went very smoothly. First, he pulled this lovely lightweight denim off the shelf at Joann that matched perfectly. Navy with a bit of a fleck, I could not have chosen better myself. Then when I sliced it up, I realized the fabric is automatically on the bias. That is what I call WINNING in the binding fabric department.

For the back, I was hoping for a grey or navy lowkey print or solid. When the quilt consultant suggested robot for his nephew's quilt, I was rather skeptical. Robots? For a minimal modern quilt? However, after circling the store a second time, I started to appreciate the minimal nature of the robots he had chosen. As you can see below, robots won.

This quilt should have arrived at is new home last week! I hope that the second little guy who gets to lie on it likes it just as much as the first.

Check out the other versions of the Modern Courthouse Baby Quilt (named by their centers):

Minty Long-legged

Citron Hortensia

Navy and Citron Hortensia

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Piecing

Black and White Quilt Printed

I finally finished printing this black and white quilt, which meant I could stitch up the remaining seams. I am so pleased with the results.

1. Larger Scale:

I have been trying to work on a larger scale. From 6"x6" farmer's wife quilt blocks to 2'x2' senior show quilts to 3'x3' for QuiltCon last year, and now almost 5'x5' !

2. Within a Design Challenge:

Seeing the "Black and White, Twelve Quilts" show this spring inspired me to create a quilt with the design parameters of monochromaticity. I work with light grey in almost every quilt, but I stretched myself and chose an off-white instead. I love the warmth the cream adds!

3. Stretching My Process:

As I explore the process of printing on quilts, I don't want to end up in a rut. With Stone + Bloom for QuiltCon last year, I experimented with masking off sections of the quilt. For this quilt, I went a step further and only partially pieced the top before printing. 

The next step in the process always takes me the longest: deciding how to quilt the quilt. I printed out my design sketch to audition several quilting options, and after some layering with tracing paper and several long collaborative FaceTimes spent staring more at my quilt than my boyfriend, I think I have decided on the direction I want to go. That boyfriend of mine is such a trooper.

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Piecing

Finished

Navy and Grey Courthouse Baby Quilt in Progress

I have found my go-to baby quilt pattern. This Spring, my Mom made a modern baby quilt that highlighted one of hand-printed fabrics, and just like that, she started an addiction. This is the third one I have made now. For the center of this modern courthouse baby quilt, I printed a panel of navy and white pistachios to pair with the bold Lotta Jansdotter stripe and solids I had chosen. The panel was a tad subtler than I intended, but I forged ahead. I am so happy with how bold and modern this one is turning out!

Check out the other versions of the Modern Courthouse Baby Quilt (named by their centers):

Minty Long-legged

Citron Hortensia

Navy and Citron Hortensia

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Finished

My Black and White Twelve Quilt, a beginning

Inspired by the Black and White Twelve Quilts exhibition in New York this past weekend, I decided to make my own. You don't get to be included among the quilter's you admire by sitting on your hands, right? This is the first stage of piecing completed. (Although after taking pictures, I did realize that the outside two black stripes might not quite be in the right spots...)

I am planning to print it, but instead of masking out sections like I did for Stone + Bloom, I decided to try a partial piecing method. Then I can flip sections out of the way to get continuous printing that skips a strip or two. If that doesn't quite make sense to you, stop back in a couple weeks. I am hoping to do a time lapse video of the printing process as I print and flip and print.

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Printing

Finished

Modern Courthouse Quilt | featuring Hortensia test print

This crinkly version of the Modern Courthouse Baby Quilt in navy and grey was delivered to its new parents. It is backed in a soft and silky stripe and bound in it as well. The bindings that I had chosen ended up feeling a bit staid, so I trimmed off the excess backing and pieced it into binding tape! It adds a fun finish as the stripes alternate around the edge. Plus, who doesn't love a good striped binding?

Be advised. I think I'm going to just be posting photos on the blog for a bit. My work has been demanding quite a bit of writing, so my heart just hasn't been in my blogging. That said, the lapse in my blog is disheartening, and I would prefer for silent photo posts than no posts at all. Enjoy the eye candy!

-Kelsey

Modern Courthouse Quilt | featuring citron Hortensia

I may have mentioned last week that I want to make a baby quilt for every one of my fabric designs. Here is the first. Let me tell you, I am just getting started.

Digging through my stash, I am realizing just how many colorways and test prints I have accomplished. There could be a lot of baby quilts in my future. Inspired by Hopewell's Courthouse Steps Baby Quilt and a quilt my mom made with my minty Longlegged print, I jumped right into the pile.

I paired some gorgeous buttery Art Gallery Pure Elements solids in Empire Yellow and Peach Sherbet with my very own Hortensia in citron (available for sale in my Etsy shop). Magically, I had a sumptuously soft peach floral stashed that went perfectly for the backing.

When I sat down to quilt it, I made a discovery. My stitch guide does not attach to my walking foot. How silly is that? (I have now seen Nicole of Modern Handcraft masking tape her guide to her foot, so I will try that next time.) Not to be stopped, I had a masking tape party with Paul and Mary of the Great British Bakeoff. Together we plowed our way through cakes, biscuits, and quilting. I have found my new favorite quilting companions!

Initially I thought a fun stripy citron binding would do the trick. However, the longer the stripes sat on the folded quilt, the more I felt they clashed with the backing. At the last second before walking out the door to sewing night, I traded the stripes for Pure Elements Apricot Crepe. The result is delicious.

Per encouragement from my mom, I practiced my machine binding skills to give it a sturdy washable finish. It truly is much faster to machine bind. (If you get it right the first time and don't take the whole thing out twice like I normally do.) I think I am going to keep practicing machine binding. It adds a quick and sturdy finish to quilt.

And on the next baby quilt! (Shh don't tell, but I've actually already finished the next one and will be sewing on the binding tomorrow night.) Can't stop. Won't stop. Have a lovely Tuesday.

Modern Courthouse Baby Quilt | featuring minty Longlegged

My cousin is having a baby! We all know what that means: baby quilt time. Her nursery colors are mint and grey, and she is expecting a boy. Mint and grey boy baby quilt. Challenge accepted.

My mom (also an avid quilter) and I decided to tag team the effort. I picked out my coveted minty long-legged flamingo fabric print to use as the central print. (After all, if I will not cut into my hoarded fabric for family, is there anyone I will cut into it for?) Then my mom went to Pink Castle Fabrics to find more greys and mints. (I may have slowly siphoned them all out of her stash and into mine...)

Mom decided to pattern the quilt after our mutual quilt-design idol, Hopewell Quilts. Although Hopewell has closed their doors, you can still find many of their quilts on Pinterest and Instagram. The pattern we chose was their modern Courthouse Steps variation.

There were many iterations of color choices. Sometimes choosing just four fabrics is much harder than choosing ten! I didn't see or feel the final product until my cousin opened it at her baby shower, but backed in light gray double gauze, it's just about the softest cutest minimal modern baby quilt I've ever seen. (I, of course, am biased, but there you have it.)

I now want to make a baby quilt for every one of my hand-printed fabrics. It requires less than a fat quarter of the focal print and then can be paired with solids and low volumes from your stash or local quilting shop. Which of the prints in my shop would you like to see made into a baby quilt next?

In all honesty: I have an entire slew of photos ready to post about the second Modern Courthouse Quilt I just finished a few nights ago, but I realized that I should perhaps post the inspiration first.

Eggplant Modern Printed Quilt Finish

Last January, my aunt commissioned a quilt for above her fireplace. We chatted about color schemes and styles, and I pieced this large grey and white morning star quilt block. Then I stalled. For months. But in December, knowing that I would be flying to the west side of Michigan for a baby shower for my cousin, I decided that this quilt would be my next completion. And here it is: completed!

It is based off of Morning Star, a quilt from my senior collection, "She Can Laugh at the Days to Come." The deep eggplant printing lends a stronger graphic quality to the final composition. I also experimented with a dark navy straight-line quilting thread instead of matching the grey, and the pop balances the blooms, I think. At just under 30" square, this quilt is a bit of an up-size from the original Morning Star, and I love the final product.

I bound this baby using my new clover binding clips while watching Ellen's Design Challenge with Brent. Talk about a good evening, and a good finish. I just dropped it off at its new home this past weekend, and I can't wait to get a picture of it above the mantle!

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Inspiration

Sandwiching

Straight-line Quilting

Straight-line Quilting + Eggplant Printing

Straight-line quilting on the modern eggplant-printed quilt is complete! I whipped out the second half last Wednesday at sewing night while watching the Philadelphia auditions for American Idol. My current idol favorite is Jenn Blosil. She is hilarious and unique and such a hoot but so great to listen to as well. Have you been keeping up with the auditions? They make for good sewing tv, except that as soon as someone starts singing, I feel like I should stop adding the chug chug of my machine to the mix.

Brent was a doll and held up my quilt for me this weekend since I am out of masking tape. I guess it's time to swing by Target! (Alert: danger zone. Target also has a quilted men's sweatshirt I'm kind of dying to have but since Brent already owns it...I'm not sure if I'm allowed to buy it as well...) The next step is tying all of those threads to the back. Then it will be free-motion quilting time. I decided to try lines first this time to achieve a flatter quilt with less chances of puckers. So far so good.

I've been wanting to get back into posting progress photos, but if I post them on their own, then the finished post doesn't have any progress photos...dilemma. What do you think?

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Inspiration

Sandwiching

Finish

I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday today over at Freshly Pieced. Hop over there to see some more unfinished beauties.

Eggplant Modern Printed Quilt

My aunt requested a printed quilt for her mantle an embarrassingly long time ago, so I decided it should be my first finish of 2016. (After it failed to be my final finish of 2015, but we don't have to talk about that.) This Saturday evening, I turned on Ice Age 2 and straight-line quilted a whole half of the quilt. Ice Age 2, you ask? Well, I needed a movie that I didn't love, so that I wouldn't be tempted to look up from my machine and take long pauses between lines. Success.

I'm greatly enjoying the process of this quilt and plan to finish it in time to deliver it to her in person February 6th at my cousin's baby shower. Baby shower, of course, means baby quilt! My mom and I are tag-teaming on this one, and I sent her some of my mint flamingo fabric. I haven't actually used that in a project yet (can you say fabric hoarder?), so I can't wait to see the final product!

The printing on this quilt is a dark eggplant. It turned out a little darker than expected but makes for a striking quilt. I decided on a blue grey thread that is a little darker than I used on the previous incarnation of this quilt. It should balance out the dark blooms nicely.

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Inspiration

Straight-line Quilting

Finish

I am linking up to WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced for the first time in a long time. Head over to see other masterpieces in the making.

Stone + Bloom: QuiltCon

There are simply too many ideas rolling around inside my head to have enough time to quilt them all. QuiltCon was a great opportunity to actually realize one. I have been experimenting with screen printing on quilts for almost two years now, and it was time to scale up. Measuring about 3' x 3', this is my largest printed quilt yet. Big isn't actually all that much slower to piece and sandwich, but quilting it does become a bigger beast.

I began with free-motion quilting the blooms one Wednesday. It seemed like the logical place to begin, and then I stalled. I always forget the number of hours I can spend staring at a quilt deciding how to quilt it. Eventually, I decided on matchstick quilting the white bars, but stopped at the edge of the printed blooms.

The grey was more difficult. Beginning with 1-inch spaced straight lines, I wasn't happy with the wrinkles and how much the pistachios faded from the design. After several more hours of staring at it taped to the dining room wall over Thanksgiving, I added more quilting to the the solid grey to achieve half-inch spacing.

The whole quilt was a little wonky after quilting, so I pinned it to my printing board and blocked it with a spritz bottle and then began the Great Binding Debate. (Did you know that I have had multiple quilts that arrive at this step and never make it further because every binding I audition feels like it will ruin the design? #perfectionistquilterproblems) Eventually, I decided red but with bits of grey. That way red wouldn't touch the red blooms along the edge. I still think light grey could have been zen...or boring...we will never know.

I also can't decide which side I like up. What do you think? Horizontal or vertical bars?

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Inspiration

Progress

QuiltCon Making in Spare Moments

In the spare moments between class and collaborations, I have been working my way towards my first submission to Quilt Con. I'm pretty pumped. It is a scale up of a Lenten Twelve (below) from this spring combined with some of the quilt printing I have been experimenting with, such as Lenten Twelve II and Evening Star.

I wanted higher impact, so I scaled up to 3' x 3.' It's funny because piecing it took just as much time as the little one, but voila: more bang for your buck! I say that now, but I know that it will take me longer to quilt it...

Then I printed it with my iconic hydrangea print and blocked out the white bars from being printed. (Iconic is my way of saying that I have used that hydrangea print for so many projects now that...well...I am looking forward to designing new patterns.) I bit the bullet and loosely free-motion quilted around all of the printed hydrangeas, and now the past two evenings have been spent staring at the quilt trying to decide how to proceed with the quilting.

I have two questions for you:

1. Is there a specific way that you must tie off your quilting on the back for an exhibition? Must we bury our threads on the back? Can we reverse a little? Is it personal preference?

2. How big is too big of an area to have un-quilted on a quilt?

I hope your QuiltCon making is going smoothly and wrapping up! Or that you are enjoying watching everyone else sweat while you stay above the scramble.

Best,

Kelsey

Follow the progress of this quilt with the links below:

Inspiration

Finish