Thursday, February 4, 2016

Throw Back Thursday


I was a fairly new quilter back in the early 2000's when I started this quilt. I had finished my first sampler in my beginning quilt class and I had made a very small heart quilt in a beginning applique class. I had no idea I wasn't ready to make a Baltimore album quilt, so when I saw this quilt being offered at a local retreat by the amazing quilter Pam Winberg, I signed up without hesitation.

Luckily for me, Pam was a wonderful, patient, kind and incredibly generous teacher. She showed us how to make the patchwork backgrounds for each block. She showed us wonderful techniques for making perfectly round berries and fun 3D buds and blooms. She even brought a basket of fabric scraps to share!

I had a wonderful time making this fun, folksy, scrappy quilt she had designed. I found that once my blocks were pieced, I needed to make some adjustments. The original quilt did not call for sashing, but by background fabrics weren't scrappy enough so my blocks just ran together. I decided to add a sashing to separate them. Looking back, I wish I had pieced the sashings to keep the scrappy theme, but I was a new at this whole quilt thing so I was just happy to finish the top!

It sat for several years while I screwed up the courage to hand quilt it. I did finally finish hand quilting it on a beach trip in 2006. It has some magnificent puckers in the back if you're curious. LOL And no I'm not going to show them to you!

I still love this quilt as much as I did the first time I saw it. Thanks to wonderful quilt teachers like Pam, I didn't ever back away from attempting a new quilt.

Enjoy every stitch!
Diane


7 comments:

  1. Perfect - my favorite style of applique design! I did not try anything nearly so adventurous when I first started quilting. Haha - I was in a quilting "hiatus" in the early 2000s; I wondered when the idea for pieced backgrounds for applique got started.

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  2. This quilt is speaking my language .

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  3. Beautiful quilt ! I'm not a specialist in applique but you made a great work !

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  4. Beautiful quilt ! I'm not a specialist in applique but you made a great work !

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  5. Delightful quilt! I love the mix of background fabrics - makes it so much more interesting.

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  6. Puckers or not it's a beautiful quilt. What a wonderful beginning in your quilting journey.

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