I love making baby quilts as gifts - they are super-distinctive, but piece up and quilt up a lot easier than a larger size. I even got to baste this on my dining table, vs. on the floor, and my back was thanking me!
The pattern - Finlay's Stars - is based off a Moroccan tile (and will be for sale soon on my Craftsy and Etsy pages, if there are any quilters reading here.) The most work here (apart from the actual quilting, which was a lot of work, since I rather painstakingly outline-quilted it) was trimming the half-square triangles to the right dimension, but apart from that, pretty smooth sailing.
Of course, I did have a lot of help with this quilt - Biscuit was intimately involved in both the quilting and the binding process!
Lots of pictures to follow - this project pretty much took over my life for all of the last week, so I'm going to show several photos of it!
All pieced-up, before adding a border
Basting on a dining table...
Biscuit *helps* with the quilting...
Quilting detail. With bonus bits of thread, which hopefully came out in the wash...
|Biscuit *helps* with the binding... (don't worry, I washed the quilt prior to giving it to the mom-to-be!)
Another photo of the finished quilt. I'm pretty impressed with my quilting diligence.
A couple of Saturdays ago, it was cold outside, and I sat down and worked on a quilt pattern all day. I promptly sent it off to my mother, and since that moment, have been calling her daily to check on its progress.
(She's in serious rebellion at this point, dear Readers. Evidently, she wants to work on her own quilting projects - not just test out my patterns. Bizarre!)
Anyway - she sent me this photo of the partially completed quilt top last night (at midnight. If I were a nicer human being, I'd be feeling guilty.)
Isn't it rather fabulous? I certainly think so. It definitely helps that blue and yellow happen to be one of my favorite colour combinations.
This pattern should be ready to go in about a month or so - I've realized that in the quilt pattern business - the perfect photo matters a lot! So - she'll finish the top, we'll send it off for quilting, it'll come back & I'll bind it, and then, I'll take photos, PDF the pattern, and put it up on Craftsy/Etsy. Lots of work. Good times!
Dear readers, I've been really busy the last couple of days, making the final adjustments to my first quilt pattern (woo hoo!), coming up with a company name, figuring out yardage requirements, and adding a second sizing option. Whoa! Lots of good stuff, I'm pretty stoked!
All of this means, I think I'm ready to publish it. For the moment, I'm thinking Craftsy and Etsy. There's a bit of logistics stuff to figure out - Paypal accounts, blah blah, but I'm hoping to put the pattern up in 2012. (Three days, Reethi - get to it!)
I was incredibly embarrassed by how lame my original pattern name was - so much so, I'm not even going to tell you what it was. Trust me, it was the lamest thing ever. And therefore, many, many thaks to Kay, Jean and Sophie for your suggestions for pattern names. All your entries inspired the final name. Kay's comment about "No Start, No End" prompted me to think of the concept of Infinity. I loved both Connections and Pathways - in the end, I went with Pathways, but I'm holding on to Connections! I think it'll come in handy for the next kolam-based quilt.
Enough talking Reethi - let's get to the picture, shall we? Here's the cover page of the pattern, featuring my mom's completed quilt top. (Well, she still needs to attach a border, but I got impatient.)
Kay, Jean, Sophie, I'll send you the pattern if I have your email address. If I don't, will you send it to me, please? And of course, if you do make it, I'd love to see pictures. Though there are a lot of steps, the quilt is easy enough to sew - it's all squares and rectangles, no curves, no triangles.
This entry doesn't have anything to do with garment sewing.
Chennai, where I grew up, is hot and dusty. Our floors were mosaic, and they were swept and mopped twice a day to keep the endless dust at bay.
Once the sweeping and mopping of the inside of the house was done, attention would be transferred to the veranda. It would also be swept and washed down, and then, while the concrete was still wet, a small kolam would be quickly drawn at the entryway to the house.
With a small handful of rice flour, the dots that acted as the grid would be laid out. Then, depending on the mood of the kolam maker, either a simple monochrome kolam would emerge, or a complex multi-coloured work of art. It was the most transient of art forms - people would walk on the kolam, disrupting the pattern, and even if we all avoided smearing the kolam, the veranda would be washed and the kolam redrawn the next morning or afternoon.
When I started quilting, I fantasized about a 'kolam' quilt, and wanted to replicate the patterns I'd seen as a child. This thought has remained in the back of my mind for many years, and I'm pleased to say, I've finally brought this to life.
For the last few months, I've been drawing kolam patterns on a grid, trying to map it out into a quilt pattern. About a week ago, I sent a completed set of instructions to my mother, my cousin and my aunt - and asked them to test the instructions for me.
Et voila! My aunt, who is a speedy and experienced quilter sent me these pictures this morning.
I'm beyond thrilled.
My mom's working on her quilt right now - her quilt is in the more traditional black & white. If all goes well with the two versions, I'll upload the quilt pattern for sale in Etsy as a downloadable pattern.
Now, if you've read the entire bit, I've a request. I need a name for this quilt pattern. Any suggestions? Please leave me a comment! (I'll sweeten the pot a wee bit - if I pick your name, I'll send you the downloadable pattern. I'll also select 2 other random comments to send a free pattern to.)
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