One of my goals for 2014 is to finish a personal project each month as a way to get to the MANY patterns I have bought in the last couple years. In the spirit of go big or go home, I started with my first real quilt (Science Fair by Jaybird Quilts). Apparently, I started with what some would consider a more complicated quilt pattern too. Oops.
On Monday, I discovered the store I originally bought the pattern from was closing this month and had sold off all their fabric. On Tuesday, while Bean was in school, I snuck over to Stitchwell Fabric with Bug to pick out a background, backing, and binding.
I originally had a very neutral print in my head for the background, but nothing in the shop quite worked so we went with the lightest oatmeal Free Spirit solid. The quilt will be in our dark grey living room and the darker hexes are my favorite part. I didn’t think I’d want a dark binding, but the black on grey linen print worked so well compared to the black on white and I am such a sucker for linen prints. Lastly, for the backing, Triangles in Gold from the Cloud 9 Alegria line. Unfortunately, there wasn’t quite enough left on the bolt, so I have some work to do with figuring out the math of how much piecing and filling in I need to do with other fabrics to make an entire back. Seriously…diving head first into quilting like crazy.
With the background on hand, I was able to quickly cut my half hexes and over the next two nights finish piecing the top!! I absolutely LOVE how it came together.
In hindsight, I may have only used yellow and greys from the Comma Zen Chic for Moda line, but it was my first time. Lesson learned right? I do really like the orange, but I wish it had more grey. I like grey. There was some Riley Blake Hipster Dot included in the fat quarter bundle. Orange on white when the Moda prints have a very soft creamy white. It was way too stark so I replaced it with the grey Metro Tile.
For my first real piecing project and jumping right into lots of angles, I’m incredibly proud of how it turned out. Not everything lines up perfectly, but the ones that do make me so happy!
I’m sure most people won’t be inspecting how my angles line up the same way I will, but still proud.
The weirdo in my even likes how the wrong side looks. All those lines.
The next part of the project will be deciding how to put together the backing of the quilt. I’m currently planning to do a cluster of hexes with some of what I have left of fat quarters. Hopefully there is enough! It will most likely be more greys than yellows so that they pop against the gold background.
Lastly, while I was planning to have it quilted by a shop, I’ve changed direction and will be doing it myself. EEK! The finished project may take a bit longer to post. I’m considering taking a free motion quilting class first.
In the meantime, I’ve opened the Etsy shop back up so that I have money to pay for these classes. So please.. go buy something! 😉
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