Cue "Dragnet"

Dun-duh-dun-dun. Dun-duh-dun-dun: DONE!

The unremarkable and non-memorable block exchange quilt is finished, washed & dried, and bagged up ready for delivery to my friend for further donation.

48" x 72"

The quilting on this is a butterfly stipple pattern. When I have multiple colors and shades as in this quilt, I prefer to use a stick-on method of marking the quilt pattern, rather than try to find a single color of chalk or erasable pen. Those will usually become invisible at least half the time, based on the fabric hue I'm trying to mark.

My (and Zoe's) favorite tool for this is Glad Press'n Seal plastic wrap.

It's like catnip to her--she just can't stay away from it!


This product has little suction cups on the "sticky" side that grip the fabric quite effectively. This stuff doesn't shift once it's patted down, but peels up easily for repositioning when necessary.

A fine-tip marking pen is perfect for tracing the quilt pattern onto the plastic. It dries immediately and doesn't smear.

The quilt is 72" long, so I traced 72"-worth of pattern (6-1/2 repeats) onto a continuous strip of the plastic, then patted it into place on the quilt. Once the strip was quilted through,

the plastic was peeled off and another 72" piece was traced onto and patted onto the quilt top for the next portion of quilting. Frankly, I find peeling off the bits of perforated plastic to be tedious, so I like to peel it off as soon as it's served its purpose, rather than wait until the entire top is quilted. (Tedious, but reminiscent of long days spent on hot, sunny beaches as a carefree/careless teenager.)

The nice thing about these quilt templates is that my spazoid marking technique cleans up quickly with rubbing alcohol.

I brought this to a chorus Management Team meeting so I could sew down the binding while listening to the topics being discussed. They're used to my need for busy hands and know it doesn't distract my attention from the business at hand. When I pulled it out, I got compliments on how pretty it was:

and then I turned it around. Gasps of surprise and delight at what a beautiful quilt I was holding! It took me by surprise, actually. I had held onto the baggage that went with this block exchange so fiercely that it obscured my view of what I was creating.

I very nearly didn't label this one, as I was basically just making it to finish up a UFO in which I had no vested interest or positive emotions. But years of reading disappointed comments about found quilts with no information made me change my mind. After looking at the top, the highly unique and outrageously inspired name for this quilt came to me, and I created its label:

Next up:

Yup: 1 table, 4 machines