Friday Quilt Finish: Color Outside the Lines is Ta-Done at Last!

 

63 x 63 Color Outside the Lines, Bear Paw + Sawtooth Star Blocks

Happy Friday, y'all!  I have a quilt finish to share with you today!  I finally put the last hand stitches into the binding of my Color Outside the Lines quilt last night, wrapping up a languishing WIP (Work In Progress) that I started way back in 2014.  Woo-hoo!

I Hope You Appreciate the Azaleas...

I goaded my grouchy and reluctant husband into driving around with me to find a photo location with azaleas in the exact shade of pink as the hand dyed fabric patches in the center of my bear paw blocks.  I was like the Knights Who Say Nih from Monty Python -- "YOU MUST BRING ME A SHRUBBERY!!!!!"  Also, I told him that none of the OTHER quilters' husbands complain that their arms are sore from holding the quilt up for so long.  😏. 

Remember what this quilt top looked like before I quilted it?  Here's that Before picture again:

Before Quilting, 65 x 65 Flimsy Completed in 2018

I love comparing the Before and After Quilting photos, don't you?  This quilt lost 2" in both directions, 3% shrinkage, just from the dense graffiti quilting design -- it has Quilter's Dream Poly batting that doesn't shrink at all, and I haven't washed it yet anyway.   

Detail in the Shade

I'm really pleased with how the teal ombre fabric worked out for the binding on this quilt.  It is SO HARD to get good photos of finished quilts that accurately represent what the quilt looks like in real life, don't you think?  The struggle is real.

60 Weight Bottom Line Thread in Silver Disappears into Fabric

I used 60 weight Bottom Line thread in Silver for this quilt so that the thread color would just melt and disappear into my Kona Snow background fabric, as well as the dark gray Anna Maria Horner print (Lou Lou Thi Clippings for Free Spirit Fabrics) that I used for the bear paw blocks.  I love how that gives the finished quilt loads of texture without the quilting thread upstaging the fabric or obscuring piecing lines, almost like the quilting design was embossed rather than stitched.

After Quilting, Prior to Binding

The Story Behind the Quilt

This might be the first quilt I ever made without a pattern, now that I think about it.  When I started it in 2014 (you can read about the quilts beginnings in this post), I'd seen a couple of really traditional bear paw quilts in a book and in a magazine, and quilts made with this block kept catching my eye so I decided to make one of my own.  I played around with the math and decided to draft a block that would finish at 10 1/2".

There are lots of other "firsts" with this quilt as well.  Prior to this quilt, I hadn't been using any solid fabrics in my quilts, let alone a solid white background fabric like what you see here.  Back in 2014, I was discovering Pinterest and began to realize that many of the quilts I was admiring and pinning to my inspiration boards had a lot more "negative space" than mine.  This was my first experiment in that direction, floating my blocks against a sea of Kona Solid fabric in Snow.  

I'm So Glad I Chose a Solid White Background Fabric!

I was also experimenting with breaking some of the "Quilt Police Rules" regarding how the scale of a printed fabric pattern is "supposed" to relate to the size of your patchwork pieces.  I liked the way my large scale Lou Lou Thi Clippings fabric print looked (it's out of print, but I found more of it here on Etsy) when I chopped it up randomly, paying no attention to where the print landed.  It reminds me of gobs of paint on an artist's palette.

Lou Lou Thi Clippings Fabric in Passion, by Anna Maria Horner for Free Spirit Fabrics

See what I mean?  I love the fat roses and butterflies in this fabric print, but I also kind of love how different the print looks in my quilt, with the pattern fractured and rearranged to be more abstract.

I also put my design wall to good use for this quilt, playing around with different sizes for the sashing width and sawtooth star blocks (you can read about that here, if you're so inclined).  The sawtooth stars were my first time using Marjorie Lee Bevis' hand marbled fabrics in a quilt project, the same hand marbled fabrics that I'm currently using in my son Anders' kaleidoscope quilt.

Finishing Touches: Ombre Teal Binding + Tula Pink Snail Print Backing Fabric

Ombre teal fabric (from my stash, it's V & Co's Ombre in Teal for Moda) was the perfect electric zing for the binding.  My backing fabric is kind of tongue-in-cheek for a quilt that took 7 years from start to finish -- it's Tula Pink's Slow and Steady snail print in Orange Crush.  Hah!

Like the Little Snail That I Am...

That brings up another point, though.  Scroll back to that photo where I've got the corner folded up to show my quilt backing.  The quilting that shows up so dramatically against the white solid fabric of my quilt top is virtually invisible against the busy backing print.

You can also see that with this client's quilt that I just shipped back to her yesterday.  Her pieced backing illustrates this beautifully because it's the same lighting, batting, same Raindrops On Water E2E quilting design, same everything.  I love the retro '70s vibe of her fun floral print fabric, but if you really want to see the quilting design on the back of your quilt, you're much better off choosing a backing that is either a solid or a tone-on-tone that reads as a solid.

Quilting Shows Up Better on Plainer Backing Fabrics

Just as an aside, I am DYING to show you the front of this quilt.  Ah, the AGONY of quilting Top Secret Client Quilts That Cannot Be Shared!!!

PSST!!  I'd Love to Quilt for YOU!

By the way, if you or any of your quilty friends has a quilt top or two that needs quilting, I'd be delighted to quilt for you!  My turnaround for edge-to-edge quilting is currently running about 2 weeks, and you can click here to find out how to book your quilt with me.

Alright, I think I've rambled on long enough for today.  That kaleidoscope quilt isn't going to finish piecing itself, now, is it?!  I'm linking up today's post with the following linky parties:

SATURDAY

UFO Busting at Tish in Wonderland

SUNDAY

Frédérique at Quilting Patchwork Appliqué

Oh Scrap! at Quilting Is More Fun Than Housework

MONDAY

Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts  

Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt

BOMs Away at What a Hoot Quilts

WEDNESDAY

Midweek Makers at Quilt Fabrication

Wednesday Wait Loss at The Inquiring Quilter

THURSDAY

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation  

Free Motion Mavericks with Muv and Andree

FRIDAY

Whoop Whoop Fridays at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Off the Wall Friday at Nina Marie Sayre

 TGIFF Thank Goodness It’s Finished Friday, rotates, schedule found here: TGIF Friday