QOV #3 for 2016

Oh boy! Do I have some catching up to do or what?!!!!

Things have been really busy this summer. Too many hours at work. A few camping trips. A awesome birthday party for Ms M. Several QOV quilts for a special presentation this August. And a wonderful 4th of July.

Where oh where to start?

With the quilts of course!

There is a big presentation scheduled here in the middle of August. I had three that needed to be done by the middle of July so that there was time to get them bound. I have had these quilts for a while, but haven’t been able to get to work on them. So of course 1 week before they were due I got started. 3 quilts? 1 week? Um, sure!

When I get the quilts they are all folded up in a bag. So I don’t really know what I am getting. I was really hoping for 3 that needed an all over, because seriously, 3 quilts + 1 week does not = CUSTOM.

Then I opened this…

Ohhhh, look at all that white space just calling for custom. I just couldn’t do an all over on this.

I decided to worry about the block strips later and all their white space later. The side borders weren’t going to show anything. So I did some simple Xs and swirls. The green sashing got some undulating feathers.

With those done it was time to determine how to treat the block strips. Nothing was really jumping out at me. So I broke out the sheet protectors and started drawing. I needed something that looked good but could still be done on a time budget.

Option 1: Single feathers.

These I could do SUPER fast. And they would look really nice. But, they weren’t speaking to me. And, there was nothing from this that I could pull into the blocks except to maybe stitch in the ditch the piecing. Dang, that was going to be a LOT of ditch work.

Option 2: Mirrored Feathers.

This would require only minimal marking. Just a line to aim the feathers to. Hmm. Still not quite right. Again, no help inside the block.

Option 3: Arched feathers.

This would require me to mark the spines.  It was far to similar to what was done in the green sashing, and it didn’t really pull the rest of the piecing into the block. Hmmm.

This quilt really was screaming for a secondary pattern.

Option 4: Circles & Piano keys

Now that was screaming at me!!! SQUEEEEEE!!!! This design. THIS design. This DESIGN!!!! Dang, look at all that ruler work. This was going to take a lot of time.

But really. It had to be done. I still had no idea what to do inside the blocks. But this. THIS is what needed to be done in the white space.

So first to sew the circles. Bonus, I get to use my new circle templates!

To make these faster, I did not do each circle individually. I did all the bottom arcs working right to left. Then I did all the top arcs working left to right.

Then I echoed the archs. And did the piano keys.

But while I was doing the piano keys inspiration struck for the blocks themselves!!!!!! I could continue the arc inside the piecing for almost a orange peel. And then use a smaller template and repeat the same idea inside the block. IT WAS PERFECT!!!! It wasn’t too distracting on the piecing. It carried the design into the blocks. And it was going to be SIGNIFICANTLY faster than ditching each block. I LOVED IT! Bonus, I could to all of it with out any additional thread cutting. Just keep working my way left and right!

Finally I did the feathers in the open arcs. Again, I did the bottom arc working right to left. And the top arcs working left to right. This allowed me to do each row very very few thread cuts. Unless I ran out of bobbin thread it took only 1 cut. My pianio keys are not pretty working left to right. So for that I had to cut and go back to the right side of the quilt.

This is one of those quilts that I wish the back was less printed. It would have made an awesome “2nd quilt”

This quilt was really hard to fold up and send off for binding. We had a good thing going. I love it when the quilts speak to me. It feels like we become friends. And this quilt and I had become good friends. I hope its new owner likes it as much as I do.