Friday 20 July 2012

Rainy Days – Finished

Oh yes I have a finish this week! Okay so it’s not Peacocks in the Garden which still sits folded up, shoddily quilted, and not touched for a few weeks now. I will get to that eventually. Once I can bring myself to unpick the crappy quilting.

Instead I have finished my Rainy Days mini quilt! Thanks folks for the suggestions on how to quilt it! I so nearly went with my standard stitch in the ditch quilting, but I didn’t! I was brave and tried something different! It’s still straight line quilting, but I actually quilted over my umbrellas. Yes I know that’s what you’re supposed to do but I haven’t really done it before because I’m scared my quilting will screw up my blocks.

Quilting

But I was pleasantly surprised! Instead of mucking up the blocks, I think it adds to it beautifully. Now it looks like rain on the grey day umbrellas. The poor corner brollies are copping a soaking with that dreadful sideways rain – you know the kind that drenches you to the skin and makes you wonder why you’re carrying an umbrella in the first place?

Diagonal quilting

The other umbrellas are getting more sedate straight-from-the-sky-rain.

Straight line quilting

Though apparently the rain on this umbrella is acid rain as it’s done something weird to the handle. Clearly not my poor lining up of seams. Let’s blame global warming. Or something.

I may have gotten a bit crazy with the basting on this. But I was determined this sucker was not going to move!

Basting overkill

And it worked! Each umbrella behaved itself perfectly. Even the cheeky orange one. I think it’s reformed now.

Umbrella mini quilt

Loving this little mini! Has lots of little bits of favourite fabrics mixed in – some Lush, some Hoo’s in the FOrest, Good Fortune, Cuzco and some good old Spotlight specials.

Final measurements are um approximate. Yes because I didn’t take final measurements. Let’s say it’s 14.5” square. That sounds like it was formally measured. Yes well. Let’s move on from my shoddy maths and measuring. Did I mention this mini is reversible?!

Back of mini quilt

Decided to use my 8” test umbrella on the back! Yay! One less orphan block! Woohoo! (Got orphan blocks? Join the rest of us on 1st August for the Practically Paper Piecing Blog Hop – blatant blog hop advertising).

And I think I’m finally getting the hang of this binding thing. Ironing it over to the front makes such a big difference. I didn’t use a single pin when sewing the binding on (compared to the gazillions I used to use and still ended up with wonky binding!).

Backing of quilt with binding

I use the machine binding method suggested by Amanda of Crazy Mom Quilts – it means you get this extra line of stitching on the back but I consider it a design feature. :)

Brolly collage

Gratuitous collage photo because I love this mini so much. I have no idea what I’m going to do with it now but I love it. So next on the list – a big umbrella quilt for rainy days! Want to try your own umbrella quilt? I’ve popped the pattern on Craftsy (yes more blatant advertising – I’ll stop now).

So there’s my Friday Finish! Pop over to visit Beth at Plum and June to see some other Friday Finishes!
TGIFF 2_new

21 comments:

  1. Your quilting looks brilliant, I love the slanting rain, fortunately none of that here today!

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  2. This is a lovely quilt, the colours would cheer up any rainy day

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  4. AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME!!! (sorry for shouting)
    Such a cool mini! Love the quilting (but not the horizontal rain)

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  5. Love your quilting on this one. Sometimes you have to push your own boundaries. You did this time and look at what you got! Too cute! (and nothing wrong with a bit of blatant advertising!)

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  6. This is just great, and so appropriate for the UK weather right now! In fact you are probably tempting fate because I think the sun is finally going to make an appearance this weekend, hence no need for umbrellas lol! Good job with the quilting too, I love the diagonal 'driving rain' quilting! Well done on a finish, it's a great feeling :-)

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  7. I wondered how to quilt it too. You made the perfect choice. I really like the result.

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  8. This just gorgeous! Yes the quilting looks like rain. That's exactly what I thought when I saw the first photo! :D

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  9. The quilting is absolutely p-e-r-f-e-c-t for this mini. I saw the rain even before you spelled it out. Freaking fantastic! Such a reward for leaving your comfort zone. :D

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  10. That is such a cute quilt! I love the quilting with the umbrellas!

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  11. Well done! Love the effect of the straight line quilting going in different directions - perfect!

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  12. What a beautiful finish! The quilting really does look like rain. Awesome use of the orphan block there too =D

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  13. What an awesome mini!! Good job!

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  14. This turned out so well! I adore the quilting.

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  15. I love this project! It was brilliant to add the quilting lines like you did. It certainly adds to the story of the umbrellas. I also love that you did the background in grey. Truly, a story being told with this mini quilt.

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  16. It is just gorgeous! I LOVE the quilting it is soooo rainy. Love the umbrella on the back too. What a fabulous mini quilt.

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  17. Thanks for stopping by my blog and looking at my Pink Churn Dash! It's nice to have comments. I just love these umbrellas!! First time I have ever seen them done in paper piecing..Great Job!!

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  18. Okay, I had to stop a moment to go buy that block before I started to comment! That is going to be a sweet block, I very much like what you accomplish, Bravo! The stitching you choose so reminding me of the 280 days of rain, snow and overcastness from Juneau, Alaska where we are from. Thank you!

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  19. This is the cutest thing ever too! :D I love the mix of the straight and diagonal quilting lines. It really does look like rain!

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  20. If I can make the red herring block, do I have enough experience to make this umbrella block?

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