She's Not Blue

Today is the day I've been waiting for: the quilt I made for my sister Sue is being delivered. This quilt was truly a labor of love: love for my sister and love for quilting. Last spring, during shut down, I made a quilt for my sister Mindy. It wasn't a big plan, just a bundle of quilting fabrics I bought from a quilting friend for $3 that I managed to put together into a pleasing pattern. I liked it, quilted it with her name in it, and sent it off. It was more of a whim than anything but this time I wanted to make a quilt that was more of a custom order, just what the recipient would want. 

Finding a bundle of blue quilt fabric at the Goodwill Outlet (I always seem to find these great bargains), I brought them home, washed, and set them aside while I contemplated their use. Over time I finally thought about Sue's love of the color blue so maybe I would make her a blue quilt. Checking out quilt patterns, I fell in love with Triple Barnstar quilt pattern by Amy Gibson

and thought it fit with my sisters decor also. I sent her a photo of the pattern and a stack of fabrics to see how she liked them and if she would like a quilt like this. It was an enthusiastic YES so I got started. The cutting and piecing went together very fast, maybe due to the rather large size of the pieces, and I used my Singer 66 Red Eye treadle for the piecing. I can't explain why but I like to piece on the treadle!

Spread out on the bed: looking good

This photo was before sewing it together and it seemed okay; I sent this photo to my quilting daughter, Kelly, and she also liked it. Here it is spread out on the porch floor

In full view, top pieced and sewn together.

I shared this photo with several people and all were fine with it. I added the row of four stars at the top and bottom so it was bigger and better able to fit on a queen sized bed, the requested size. By now I hope you have found the flaw in my assembly. Take a good look at the corners: the two on the right are facing out (correct) and the two on the left are not. Of course, I didn't discover this until I was way too far into the free motion quilting to make the change. I guess this just shows how "unique" this quilt really is!

Next up was the quilting and I spent many hours trying to figure out what to quilt where. After learning more from online quilting sessions, I wanted to highlight the white spaces and let the blue fabrics have a supporting role. Once I figured out what to quilt where on a quarter of the quilt, it was easy to repeat the patterns on the next quarter and the next until I was all done. It has a star theme:

Large white spaces with stars and fill

This gets difficult to describe but I made three star templates that I then used to trace out the stars and then use a fill of meandering loops. Some spaces have scallops in large or small proportions, there are other sections that have been divided into quarters for looped lines. Well, you get the idea. I loved how the final wide white border turned out with packed leaves and it was fun to do, too.

Wide border before binding

Which sewing machine did I use? It's a new-to-me Elna Quilting Queen 7300 that I just picked up in the last month and is she a beauty!

Elna Quilting Queen 7300

I knew it would be a good machine and it was a very good deal but I didn't know I was going to use it for this quilt but it has some very perfect features. The free motion was made so much easier, I love the thread cutting (it's better than my Viking Designer 1), bobbin winding was super easy, the presser foot can pull way up and lock in place to get the bulk of the quilt under the foot, it came with a large table to help support the weight of the quilt, and it was just fun! I did have to watch my tension and when I forgot I ended up taking out three sections and quilting them again. It could be my new main machine but we shall see. Much to my surprise, it also has a built in walking foot that I used for the binding:

Walking foot on Elna 7300

It was just like the Pfaff IDT where it pulls down from the back of the presser foot and locks in place. I'm using it now for a chenille quilt and it's just perfect, keeping the fabric from sliding out of alignment. Finally, I made up a label using a Singer Quantum XL400 embroidery machine:

Label on the back corner

I took the quilt to church and my daughter's house for better chance on getting the whole quilt into a photograph so here's the final result:

Triple Barnstar in blue with added stars

It's out for delivery today and I can't wait until she gets it because she knows how much labor is involved and how much I love her. The flaws and errors? It just shows that it wasn't made on a machine but was quilted at home just for her. 

UPDATE:

Sue got her package on Wednesday so we had a long phone conversation at night: she loves it! Just so you can see it in her home, here is a photo she sent:

Triple Barnstar in blue for Sue