Tea Leaf Quartet Quilt finish

Last year I got the idea that I wanted to try a quilt top design with curved piecing after focusing on log cabin blocks made with all long strips. I found a pattern for free from Tim Latimer the quilter who blogs about hand quilting in Michigan. Tim is really good and really fast at hand quilting and is always an inspiration for me. I follow his blog Tim Quilts ( link to the post I used as my guide for this quilt) he does all sorts of quilting projects and on his blog tells how and is very generous Tim Quilts has new posts about once a week.
I had a collection of fabrics I bought earlier shopping in Manassas at Hancock Fabrics and Joann's with my mom in a matched color way and then I added a little more from my stash. I decided to adjust the block pattern a little for my first repeat pattern curved piecing project. Tim used fat quarters and I had lots more fabric than he did so I added a quarter inch to my  the edges of the curves to allow a 1/4 inch along the seam at the edges of the finished blocks. That was the only design change I made. I even used his pattern of quilting stitches for my quilt. but I wasn't as fast as his fast quilting goes. As a matter of fact, I realized once I was into the quilting it was way too much for me. I struggled to get the quilting done all year but finally have it completed it, bound and washed and dried.... Ready to share. It's a throw size 46 x 61 inches. I used black pearl cotton #8 to do the leaf pattern and echo the leaf shapes in the design. 

The blocks finished up at 8 inches square for each leaf and took me one hour and 17 minutes to quilt completely using Tim's intricate design. The quilting shows up best in the salmon and sage green blocks and on the back solid salmon.  

There is one block I left without black quilting veins that I tried to label on the reverse by embroidering my title block right on the finished quilt. I don't recommend labeling this way but maybe with practice I could do better...

The entire back shows the great leaf and circle in squares design of the intricate quilting pattern. label at the left near the center. 

This was a fun quilt and I loved the resulting quilting patterns but the labor made it something I would simplify for future hand quilting projects. I am grateful to Tim for giving us a good pattern to begin me down the curved piecing pathway. More to come! It's not as hard as you might think if you never did a curve look for help and give it a try once you get the hang of it you won't look back. 

seminole quilt

Seminole quilt began as strips of red and yellow fabrics 

the sandwiched Seminole while I was quilting it at DC Modern Quilt Guild [photo by Jessie Aller]

Keith caught me sewing on the yellow calico binding

the back is tiny white pinpoint dots 

back machine quilted lines match the top side stripe pattern 

I like the stripes all bunched up to make a jumble of patterns

final the Semiole quilt completed

It is all done. The red and yellow Seminole single quilt. It's 76 x 52 inches and all machine pieced and quilted.  Piecing this project was a lot of fun working to create the various stripe patterns. Using a rotary cutter, straight edge ruler and cutting mat helped make this easier than it would have been with scissors. All that I have left to do is make a label and attach it to the back. I made it this year 2012 from start to finish. It has rows of straight line quilting to match the stripes on the top. Very simply done made it go fast and reduced the stress and anxiety of making mistakes. I laundered it yesterday and it came out just about like it went in, I can't see any difference but it's softer. I got a few good pictures before it goes in the wash just in case something goes wrong. This is a traditional Native American design I know I will be using again.
Now back to the Rose-Star project, quilting by hand, a much slower but still a very satisfying experience.
Today I discovered another man who quilts while looking at Pinterest quilt boards. Joe Cunningham has been quilting since 1979. He works abstractly and makes some very beautiful modern quilts. He has a blog here as Joe the quilter. He has written several books and does shows and lectures classes etc. in addition to quilting. His latest book is "Man Made Quilts: Civil War to the Present" a catalogue for the show of the same name at the Shelburne Museum in Vermont. It is interesting to think about quilts made by other men because in America it seems so unusual. It wasn't always this way and Joe wrote a book on 30 men who quilt which is going on my wish list today...

Happy Holidays everybody!