I finished quilting and binding the vintage spool top tonight. Here are picks before washing:
Honestly, there are a few tucks and puckers on the top. I ended up quilting with one hand on the machine and one on the quilt top trying to work out the extra fabric.
I chose not to prewash the backing fabric and I used a cotton batting that would shrink. When the quilt is washed, the backing will shrink up more than the top. The backing ends up pretty flat and there will be more texture on the front of the quilt. I figured this was a good way to hide the puckers and tucks. Here are pics after washing and drying:
I made this green dog quilt a number of years ago. You can read about it here. It was given to an animal rescue for a fund raiser. I still love it.
So it was inspiration for my new grandson’s quilt. It’s been a while so I tried pinning the bias tape to my ironing board to form the dog shape. This looks terrible!
I decided to just work directly on the background that I had already quilted. Better, but I still didn’t like it.
I realized that I needed to work on a lower table than my ironing board and that helped immensely. This is closer!
I was given this block a few years ago by a friend. Her applique is wonderful! So nice, that I’m afraid I will ruin it.
But I’ve been pondering how to finish it. I think it might need a border is HSTs.
I don’t like the scrappy look of these HSTs, but they were handy to try out some ideas.
See the white print below? That is the background of the applique. I don’t have anything that matches. I thought I’d make my triangle from the red and solid white shown below.
Maybe red and green triangles?
I’m not in love with either of these. I think I need to start looking for a fabric that matches the background better.
Such a satisfying finish this is! I’ve counted at least 19 different pairs of hands have worked on this over the course of more than a century.
I would have liked to have hand quilted this, but my hands wouldn’t let me. The next best thing was quilting by machine with this one inch cross hatch.
I love the texture and it remains in the background, letting the blocks shine.
The backing is muslin.
I used an old repro print for the binding.
And no, it is not straight and square. And yes, some blocks got chopped off. I’m totally okay with imperfection.
I started making the blocks for this quilt two years ago! Its about time the quilt got done. And it is a big one. Big enough for a generous pillow tuck.
It was so hard to see the feathers in the plain blocks as I was quilting them. Now that the quilt is washed, they do show up a little better.
I like the way the feathers in the red border turned out.
And here is a look at the back.
I am so glad this one is finally done and off the UFO list!