I made a quilt top?!?

Remember that quilt-along that I started back in January? Well, guess what. I just finished the quilt top!! (A bit late, but hey, I’m still rather impressed with myself for making a quilt top! Just a few months ago, it was the sort of thing I never would have pictured myself making. And yet, here I am, officially a quilt-top-maker. If one can be called that after finishing a grand total of one quilt top, that hasn’t even been turned into a quilt yet.)

I’m pretty pleased with myself for this, actually. It took quite a long time, longer than it would have taken me to make a dress (or two), and there was a lot of pressing involved. But I persevered, and here it is!

I surprised myself even more by enjoying making this. There’s something quite relaxing about sewing lots and lots of straight lines, one after the other. And no fitting issues needing to be taken care of. Almost a bit like meditation, in a way.

I made the middle size in the quilt along, a 76″ by 76″ square. Which, once completed, should (hopefully) be a good size for spreading over my bed and snuggling under with a book in winter.

Can I just say – it’s kinda hard to get a photo of an entire 76″ square. Firstly, I hung it on the wall between us and the neighbours. Which wasn’t quite high enough, and then the wind caught it….

Yeah. So, we tried the washing line. Which also wasn’t high enough, so in none of these photos do you get to see the top. I’m sure you can imagine what it looks like though – it’s the same as the bottom. Just an off-white border.

I think the thing I like most about this quilt top is that each of the fabrics I used have memories – they’re all scraps left over from other projects I’ve made. When I look at it, I’m reminded of those projects – the inspiration behind them, the fun of sewing them up, and (in most cases) how much I enjoy wearing them. (And will enjoy wearing them again, just as soon as I fit into them again. Huh.)

This one uses fabric from my Leaves and Hats dress for the centre star, with pink fabric from the edgings of my March dress, and brown from my Bookish Willow dress (which is still one of my favourite dresses, I really must make that pattern again sometime, it’s so easy to wear….).

The next ‘starburst’ has a centre star made from leftovers from my All Buttoned Up dress, and the surrounds use pink floral from my March dress and yellow-with-birds from a dress I made for a friend.

And these next two use the same fabrics as before, in different combinations:

Since I was using scraps from other projects for the quilt (and a length of off-white cotton that has been lurking around for ages, heck knows where I got it from or why, for the background) I only used six different fabrics for the quilt designs, rather than the twelve different ones that the pattern called for. I like how the fabrics are repeated in different ways and combinations here. (I also really like that they go well with my bedroom walls, which are a soft buttery yellow.)

(My piecing isn’t all that perfect though, but hey – first time trying it all out. Plus I didn’t have a quilting ruler – I went and bought one after I’d finished the quilt top. Guess I’ll need to try another quilt, just so I can compare using one vs not….)

And here’s one just to give you an idea of the size. Spot the cat down on the bottom left there? (That’s Roxy, checkin’ it all out.)

Next up, I’m going to try my hand at free-motion quilting. I went and bought a free-motion foot for my machine the other day, so here’s another new skill to learn! Fun! 🙂 (Although I must admit to being somewhat nervous about navigating my way over such a large item on just my little domestic machine. Hmmm.)