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A Timeline for a Quilt

February 2009 – buy fabric.
February to Summer – pet fabric, envision gorgeous quilts, remain paralyzed in fear of cutting beautiful fabrics.  Scour flickr for quilt inspiration.
Summer – Select quilt pattern.  Engineer how to make quilt.  Cut bazillions upon bazillions of little triangles. Get sick of cutting.
Fall to Winter – Forget about quilt.
Spring – remember fabric half cut for quilt.  Dig out pieces.  Remember plan.  Finish cutting other bazillion triangles.  Start piecing.  Interest in other projects surpasses interest in quilt. 
June/July – In fit of motivation, finish piecing quilt. 
July – Momentum continues! Quilt top finished, sandwiched, bound, and quilted. 
Now the real question is how do all you flickrites manage to post freshly finished quilts on a weekly (or less!) basis? 

Pattern:  No real pattern. I found a couple photos of kaleidoscope quilts on flickr and fell in love.  I bought a 45 degree triangle quilting template, but halfway through the project ordered a kaleidoscope-specific template.  

quilt3

Notes: 
We had some guests over while I was finishing up the quilt top and someone gave me what I consider the ultimate compliment – “wow, this looks like something you’d find in anthropologie!”

I really wanted to play with hot pink as an accent color, but knew there would be no chance J would be cool with a hot pink bedspread, even in miniscule amounts.  So, I went with red.  I still would prefer hot pink, but I’m digging the red.

quilt

Overall, I’m in love with the quilt.  I had some moments of doubt during its construction – things like whether or not the gray was dark enough, whether the colors would achieve the look I was striving for, whether my imprecise piecing would be evident, etc.—but now that it’s done, I love it. 

93 | 365 top, binding,
back

I’m usually drawn to the boldest prints and colors in each fabric collection, which are gorgeous on their own, but often too distracting in quilts. I forced myself made a strong effort to choose some small-scale prints and introduce a level of simplicity with the quilt.  Hence, all the 45 degree triangles are the same print in each block.  I think employing some restraint worked out.   

Fabrics:
A mix of:
Anna Maria Horner’s Good Folks
Amy Butler’s Lotus 
Heather Bailey’s Pop Garden
Kona Ash
With this out of the way, I can work on some little projects for the little chicklet, set to arrive in 8 short weeks!

Quilting:
Because this is a queen-sized quilt, I kept things simple.  I stitched a line on either side of each block seam and then through the center of the block, both vertically and horizontally. 

Comments

Gorgeous quilt. I love the backing fabric too.
Kristine said…
I am absolutely in love with this quilt. It's the prettiest, most inspiring quilt I've seen on flickr in a while. Wow. And it so happens I found I have a Kaleido-ruler in my possession. If it wasn't after midnight I'd start cutting some fabric right now. Well done on a beautiful quilt.
Marga (MarPie) said…
It is a beauty and I think that maybe someday......
Love the pattern in it very much.

Warm regards,
Marga♥

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