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I have been taking quilting classes at the local adult school. my teacher is famous in this area; every quilter I know has taken classes from her at one time or another. She, unfortunately, is retiring at the end of this semester. She may return in Feb next year with a much smaller class load than she supports now. I will miss her greatly.
This semester’s project is bargello quilts. Kathy gave us all the instructions, like always, and I was unable to just follow them as given, like always. The pattern called for 5 fabrics, I used 8. I was supposed to sew the ends of the strips together to make loops, i laid my strips out the full length and then added black strips to each. I had to figure out the borders and patterns for them. I just had to re invent the wheel the whole way through. I posted a picture recently here of the first bargello quilt I made. It is now queen sized, the top is finished, and it is in the tub marked “finished tops to ?” until I gain such machine quilting skills as to complete it and get it on my bed.
The one shown here today is a little larger than a baby quilt but not large enough to be a lap quilt except for a child. I followed all instructions to the letter, (well, mostly) and it turned out very nicely. Lil Zen says the colors are horrible but I like them fine and I have to use what I have. I was able to do all the quilting on my machine and I am getting better, slowly. I bought a few stencils and borrowed some from my class. I have found I do better with a pattern that I expect rather than the meandering stitch I really want to use. The main part of this quilt uses the meandering stitch and the borders have a single row of a pattern called orange peel.
So, what are you working on today? Maybe you are just celebrating Mother’s Day and not quilting at all. Whatever you are doing, enjoy the day.