Hanging on the wall at last!
 |
| approx 62 inches by 56 inches |
I was expecting all the EPP seams on the half inch hexagons to be hard going with hand quilting but they weren't too bad - just a bit bumpy at times. The hand quilting progressed surprisingly quickly and I was finished within a month.
No marking was needed as I just outlined all the 'flowers' in the garden, and followed a lot of the star and diamond edges.
To give a little definition to the outer borders (single coloured hexagons among cream ) I quilted straight through three rows all around the outside of the quilt - see below:
Just in case anyone wants to know - I used YLI cream quilting thread, thin cotton batting, a 16 inch square hoop and my usual handful of hardware (Clover brass half thimble, yellow needle puller and TJ Quick quilter spoon) - no affiliation with any of these suppliers but they are Australian stockists. After losing a couple of my usual needles (flicked into the 'ether' across the room - as you do!) I tried a new quilting needle which I now also love - Sew Easy Quilting gold eye size 9. They were $2.65 for 20 strong little needles from Lincraft - got to love that sort of economy.
The backing is a favourite old floral called 'Plantation' from Windham.
I thought that, especially as this was to be a wall hanging, this quilt would suit a no-show binding. If you google and Pinterest search there are quite a few handy tutorials on various ways to do this.
In 2014 I made a hidden binding on my 'Simon' Dutch quilt (click to see more in the link) but I was not entirely happy with the corners on the back as they were a bit bulky and not particularly neat. Mind you the quilt hangs beautifully square and I love the finish on the front.
So I decided to take a chance and give another method a try - adapting the method in this tutorial from QuiltArtNews.
To reduce bulk a little I only used a single fabric thickness (not double as in the tutorial).
 |
| a nice straight bound edge on the folded quilt |
The result is just what I hoped for - a firm, neat edge (front and back) but still flexible enough to drape. And I highly recommend the method - very easy to stitch up.
Having a bit of photo fun with a "focal black and white" faded finish - how's this for an Autumn garden photo?
