It's
un-real that I won't have another Challenge to do after this one. I am so grateful to have been able to participate in the
whole Contest and not be eliminated in the middle. I feel like I'm on Survivor, Big Brother or Amazing Race and made it to the Final 3. I know there are 12 of us Finalists... 12 different quilts and Songs. What's amazing to me is that no one chose the same lyric. I noticed mine is the only Child's Quilt, using a very old song. I had to wait for the descriptions and listen to the songs linked on the
McCall's Blog page to recognize a couple of them. They aren't all readily recognized by looking at the quilt- in my opinion.
By now you've read and hopefully Voted a few times. I wanted to do a Blog post with the making of my Challenge Quilt. How it evolved from the fabric. Like I have mentioned to many, my first thought was the Song "You are My Sunshine" because my mother and I sang it in harmony while riding in the potato truck with my dad. The song
"How Much is that Doggy in the Window" is another one that I grew up singing. I sang it to my children changing the word 'doggy' to the child's name I was singing to. Janessa remembers. She was the one who said I should make a child's quilt this time and use a children's song. As a child I only had one Puppy that was all mine. My oldest brother brought a Cocker Spaniel home unbeknownest to our parents and hid it in his locker at school during the day. Her name was Penny and I got one of her Puppies and named it "Curly". In a way this Quilt was inspired by that puppy, too. I spent at least a week with multiple songs running through my head. I have been known to burst into song when I'm extra tired... singing old Musicals and songs that match the mood. I've posted some of the ones I thought of
HERE. I had a lot of 'Input' in the choosing of my song, whether I wanted it or not.
It was the trip to Quiltmania that finally solidified my decision. I had not been to Tri-cites in a while and took the day to go and visit my friends at the Quiltshops and show them Lynn's and my new pattern. When I got to Quiltmania, I left my keys in the ignition and shut the door. Bad idea! Thankfully Deb had AAA and called the locksmith to come unlock it for me. That gave me a bit of extra time to wander and browse the store. I had thought of looking for some fabric that looked like Dogs. My Original thought was to make up a pattern to piece or applique them into the "Attic Window". When I saw this fabric with the different Dogs already on it I knew it was meant to be.
I w
ent to my Daughter; NaDell's, and showed her the fabric I'd found. She tried to suggest more songs that would work. She said it could be "Puppy Love" since I like Donny Osmond, or "Who Let the Dogs Out?" a Song played at the Columbia Burbank Basketball games. My mind was already set on using the Attic Window and the having the Block litterally bring the Song to mind. At least I hoped it would.
These are the fabrics I bought to use with it, the Border fabric didnt' get used because I didn't want the Dogs to be sideways, I wanted the focus to be the Doggy's in the Windows... The fabric with the words on it was just too dark, I liked the look of the Blue and Brown. (That means I have some more dog fabrics to add to my Stash) I "Fussy Cut" the Dogs out and made the fabric look like Swiss cheese. Here are the first few blocks done and talking to me on the wall. I kept them up there while I was thinking of how to make them look more like shelf or a Pet store window.
Testing the narrow sashing and different colored outer borders to carry the 'Window' effect out.
I made the 3-d Bow tie Blocks thinking I might surround the center with them using the Dog Bone fabric. The more I thought about it, I went with only one in each of the 4 corners and added the Blue borders to match the same width as the Bowties. It was then that the quilt said to me "DONE" .
Time to Quilt the Quilt: I took it out to Lynn's with the intent of doing an all-over pattern. The more I looked at the color of thread to use, the more I realized I didn't want to have Blue thread on the Brown and tan and I didn't want Cream thread on the Blue. Lynn suggested that the only way I could do want I wanted was to quilt it on my Home machine. Not what I wanted her to tell me. Big Problem- my Machine of choice, my Bernina, was on the Quilt Table still with a Quilt that needed Quilting. It doesn't have the Bernina Stitch regulator (BSR) that I felt I needed to do the Free-motion stitching on the borders and the Doggie squares. I went in to the Local Quilt shop and asked if it was possible to 'borrow' a machine with BSR. I considered it kind of a Test drive to show my DH that I really need a machine with it. He always says is it a "Want" or a Need"?? Thankfully, the ladies of
STASH allowed me to bring the machine home to complete the quilting. I did Stitch in the ditch around the 'windows', a meander with the words "ARF, ARF" in the outer borders and stipple around the doggies. There wasn't much thread left on the spool when I finished.
It was a lot smaller than I ultimately wanted. I took a few more days and late nights to calculate how many and what size of Prairie points to and how to make the binding work they way I thought it should. I've seen two colored binding and I knew that was what I needed to do- but how to get the Prairie points between the binding. I've only done Prairie Points in a Pillowcase turned quilt before. I knew I could figure out how to do it, but would it work?
Note to self: Next time just add one side at a time.
Prairie points don't turn the corners very well.
The Prairie Points added a few inches to the quilt making it a more usable size for an infant. No new grandchildren are on the way but I'm ready for the next one...if it's a BOY!
The Voting goes for the next 3 weeks and I hope that you all like my quilt enough to come back and Vote daily until November 8th. The Link is up on the sidebar!
