a tale of two quilts
Hello, happy Friday to you all!
I have not just one, but TWO quilts to show you today. I know, a total overachiever here :). It wasn't planned that way though. The reason I have two versions of the same quilt is that I ruined the first one (thanks to my impulsivity and lack of patience) and then had to rush like crazy to make a second version to meet the deadline.
This is the first version of my Star Bright quilt for Love Patchwork and Quilting magazine. I love working with triangles and I was totally smitten with the design and colors in this quilt top (I used all Cirrus solids).
And then it was time to baste the quilt. I use 505 spray to baste my quilts and have always loved how quick the process is. This time though, I made it a bit too quick since I decided there was no need to properly shake the bottle before I started basting and, to my complete horror, the glue left tons of tiny spots/ stains all over my quilt top.
I tried spot cleaning them but it didn't seem to help so I turned to my trusty google search and found suggestions to just wash the quilt once finished and stains would be gone, phew!
Well, not quite! Ever since I designed this quilt I planned on doing some dense quilting as I knew Cirrus solids are less tightly woven than Kona solids I usually work with and I wanted to prevent any fraying. And then, all of a sudden, I changed my mind and decided to machine quilt around large stars only and tie the rest of the quilt.
It really was a bad decision, but I made it even worse when I had less
than half the quilt tied (I planned on finishing that later) and I threw
it in the washing machine to see if the stains would come out. Yes, the
stains did come out, but when I looked closer I spotted some frayed
and ripped up seams in quite a few places!
I can't even begin to tell you how mad I was at myself! Seriously!!!
And then I calmed down (mostly because I only had two days till I needed to ship the quilt to the publisher), looked through my fabric and found out I still had enough Cirrus solids for yet another quilt, so I got to work once again.
This time though I shook the 505 can for at least 10 min as I was so freaked out about ruining this quilt also, and I quilted it with straight lines about 1/2" apart.
I'm glad to say I made the deadline and the quilt was featured in issue 43 of Love Patchwork and Quilting magazine, yay!
Plus, I'd also like to think I learned a lesson or two as well :). I really, really hope I did because this was the most stressful quilt sewing ever.
I finally got over my frustration of ruining the quilt and decided it's ok to use it even if there are a few rips in it. And Lola doesn't seem to mind even one bit. She totally made my day when I found her sleeping in this pile of quilts.
Thanks for reading friends, I hope I didn't bore you to death with my saga of these two quilts :).
Wishing you all a creative weekend. Svetlana