Sunday 6th October - The New Quilt

I started at about 9am, and gently chugged on through the day. It's going to be good to clear another "pending" project - a couple more days should see it finished.

It started with a rash purchase of a packet of cotton squares (reduced, of course, that's why I couldn't resist it!) from Oxfam, about a year ago.

From time to time I laid them out, but couldn't think how to use them. There were so many that I didn't like very much. (There are two or three of each fabric)

In the end, I decided the best thing to do would be just whang them together, any-old-how, and let them get on with each other as best they could. However, when I started doing the calculations, there weren't going to be enough for a quilt cover. I had a rummage through my boxes of bits and pieces, and found a full-length blue flowery batik print cotton dress, of a similar weight to the Oxfam squares, that I bought years ago. It is a wrap-over sun-dress that never fitted properly and tended to unwrap itself too often for happiness.

I also found a piece of old yellow duvet cover that I had dyed blue; it's really much bluer than this photograph. So that was the backing solved. An old cot blanket, that came with the second-hand cot I bought for my son, would be the padding. I much prefer re-using things as much as possible when I make quilts.

The blanket needed de-fluffing and washing, so I used a damp rubber glove to remove the fur and fluff, and washed it in the bath (the washing machine filter is blocked, remember?). I left it on the line to drip.

It was a glorious day

I was delayed by not being able to find my shoes. In the end I just wallowed around in His shoes for the short trip to the line and back.

The squares from the dress worked perfectly; I made up the horizontal strips, but was a little worried that I wouldn't have enough of them, so I added a spare strip from the dress to the top and the bottom. It took a bit of fiddling around to decide where the strips should go, and in the end I got fed up and just sewed them together.

 

 

Here's the finished top, with another go at photographing the backing fabric. I've added another strip from the dress to the middle, just in case there still wasn't enough length. I can adjust it later when I layer everything up together. All finished by 6pm, with breaks for emails and television and lunch and tea and whenever I felt like doing something different.