Jean MaDan: Done

Seeing as binding this was the subject of my last post, this finish is hardly surprising.

72" x 90"

I stepped out of my comfort zone and used a different technique with my free-motion quilting. Instead of marking the quilt (I would've marked the plainer-looking back), or tracing the design onto Press 'n Seal and sewing through strips of that (as I do in a previous post), I printed out the actual size of the pattern I wanted to use and eye-balled it as I went along.

"Fantasy Flame". The paper soon got pinned to the thread guide bar above the spool holder.

After a row or two I was familiar enough with the flow of this to proceed without the crutch of the paper.

This is a much looser pattern than I normally quilt, resulting in gaps up to 2" in which no quilting was done (due more to my eyeballing skilz than to the pattern itself), but I'm trusting in the scrim of the Warm & Natural batting to hold things together (the Q&A site says quilting can be as far apart as 10"!) I'm told this makes for a softer, cuddlier quilt too. Hope so--it's a donation quilt and I want it to be a comfort.

I have a couple of spools of specialty thread, bought years ago on a whim at a quilt show, that I always put back in the thread drawer in favor of something else. This time I pulled them out (you can see it in the shot above): Signature's "Pixelles" Trilobal Polyester (size 30). There was nothing I could do to make my Viking play nicely with this thread. It snarled and shredded and snapped when used on the top, ditto when used as bobbin thread. (Having just minutes ago used my google-foo on it, I now know this isn't meant for quilting--it's an embroidery thread.) After a couple of blocks I removed the spool and went back to my trusty King Tut. I had intended using up the trilobal instead for piecing, but now that I know its raison d'être I'm going to set it aside and see if it plays well with my Singer embroidery machine. I can always make embroidered labels with it.

The back was constructed from more of the bolt-ends of flannel I guilt-purchased a few years ago.

Perspective--all the corners are actually the same and the middle panel is centered on the back.

Label quilted in, machine-washed and -dried, and it's sitting now in the donation stack, ready for its someday home.

Picture from the binding tute, but a good shot of the label.