Binding & Boxing

Busy week in the sewing room. I got a lot done. (Not much elsewhere in the house... sadly it shows... oh well...)

I actually finished the queen sized quilt I made for my son for his first apartment!

 I had fallen in love with these two layer cakes and planned a simple patchwork queen sized quilt. 

Grunge BasicGrey for MODA & 

Modern Background- INK ZEN CHIC for MODA

As I explained in a previous rant... my seam ripper and I spent far too many hours together fighting it out- as I tried unsuccessfully & repeatedly- to quilt this thing on my standard sewing machine.

There is simply not enough space to manipulate such a large quilt and I thought I would go crazy.

So I bit my lip and passed it on to a member of my Modern Quilt Guild. 
My plan had been straight line quilting... but she explained that was hard to do on a long arm. 
Since my son is a musician, we decided on a music theme!

She sent me this image to show me her progress!

She actually quilted the whole thing & had it back to me in less than 2 weeks!

Pieced music fabric for the quilts back!

I love the quilt stitched music details

Now it was back in my hands...
I decided to piece the binding from all my remaining scraps!

I cut all my strips at 21/2" before joining them

After all my binding scraps were sewn together...

I ironed my seams flat-

& then I folded the binding strip in half.

As I pressed, I wound it around a card 

Gone are the days when I compulsively hand stitched my bindings for "everyday quilts" meant to be used & loved...

I LOVE my quarter inch edge foot!!!

After I had sewn the binding to the back of the quilt, 

I clipped it over to the front... 

and finished that binding by machine!

That final stitch always makes me feel

 such a sense of accomplishment!

This quilt is so much heavier than it looks...

(my grimace is because I came so close to dropping it!)

*****

I shipped it off to Boston yesterday...

now- all I can do is wait 

and hope it gets there in one piece- 

ready to keep my son warm & loved

Today... My friend Tricia & I started a new project! 

It is brightly colored, 

icky-sticky, 

messy, silly... 

and

to be revealed... 

NEXT WEEK!

So come back!

**** October 17, 2015 ****
My son texted me last night!

"It arrived! Thank you!!! It is lovely" ... 
photo inserted of quilt on bed...

heart emoticon "I am glad. However... That is the BACK!" heart emoticon

"It's pretty! I didn't realize XD"

frown emoticon (At least he knew it was stitched with love, but I guess I should have kept hoarding my favorites!) heart emoticon