In response to the question I realized I'd written quite a bit on how I did this quilt. So, since I'm always looking for fodder, I mean fascinating and meaningful dialog, for my blog I thought I'd pop over here and put some more information on it. The quilt was done from a jelly roll or maybe honey bun (which is larger? this was the larger roll) knock off I bought at JA's just because I loved the colors. I'm a sucker for pretty colors all rolled up together and it kept grabbing at me as I waited at the cutting table. Then I didn't know what to do with the pieces (not the first time that's happened, I assure you ) so I just started looking around for things to do with strips that didn't take a boat load of cutting. And the French Braid kept popping up as I surfed the web. I took the strips I had and cut them down as the pattern suggested (found it on the 'net - it was free. Google French Braid quilts) 
and then just started piecing. This is the link I used, it was free, easy to follow and well deserves my link back to the site, as all my piecing techniques for this came from that site. It's a very simple quilt to put together. I did some maths so I would divide out my cut down strips to make the use up my strips and make the pieces the same size. I divided my cut strips between 2 colors: Blues and everything else. And then pieced at random with the blues on one side and the everything else on the other side (for the "wave" affect). I actually put the strips in 2 bags & pulled them out randomly and pieced the number for each section (3 sections)
and then trimmed to make it rectangular. This trimming always hurts a bit - you loose quite a bit on the tops and bottoms. The only time I didn't follow actual randomness was if I got 2 of the exact same right next to each other and that may have gone by the wayside towards the end as the fabric selections weren't distributed evenly. Of course after trimming the sections, putting them together would have been too small so I trotted off to Hancock's and found the edging & back fabric - I got very lucky there with the fabric I found - it was a great color and even has a slight 'wave' design. And, believe it or not, I owned the binding fabric that I'd purchased for some fabric postcards that I didn't get to participate in. I'd wanted to piece the binding (like Kathryn did - I'm such a copy-cat) but didn't have enough pieces left. I used almost every scrap so I was quite pleased to have some purple quilting cotton just lying around. Seriously. 
I free-motion quilted it - only 2nd FM project ever and the first was just place mats - using purple machine quilting thread. (if you look very closely you will see where I did some wavy quilting down each strip - I'm slowly picking that out as I don't like it) It doesn't show up much but it was fun and I love purple. Oh, and the gecko - when I first posted the pic and called it Aruba Waves, my friend said it did remind her of Aruba but was missing the gecko. 
So I laid it aside for quite a while (and a move and family disaster along the way) until I remembered one odd night that I HAD the gecko - on the t-shirt I bought in ....wait for it.... ARUBA! It's quilted with warm and natural, I believe. That stuff makes my nose itch until it's all done so I need to find another batting for the next round.
and then just started piecing. This is the link I used, it was free, easy to follow and well deserves my link back to the site, as all my piecing techniques for this came from that site. It's a very simple quilt to put together. I did some maths so I would divide out my cut down strips to make the use up my strips and make the pieces the same size. I divided my cut strips between 2 colors: Blues and everything else. And then pieced at random with the blues on one side and the everything else on the other side (for the "wave" affect). I actually put the strips in 2 bags & pulled them out randomly and pieced the number for each section (3 sections)
and then trimmed to make it rectangular. This trimming always hurts a bit - you loose quite a bit on the tops and bottoms. The only time I didn't follow actual randomness was if I got 2 of the exact same right next to each other and that may have gone by the wayside towards the end as the fabric selections weren't distributed evenly. Of course after trimming the sections, putting them together would have been too small so I trotted off to Hancock's and found the edging & back fabric - I got very lucky there with the fabric I found - it was a great color and even has a slight 'wave' design. And, believe it or not, I owned the binding fabric that I'd purchased for some fabric postcards that I didn't get to participate in. I'd wanted to piece the binding (like Kathryn did - I'm such a copy-cat) but didn't have enough pieces left. I used almost every scrap so I was quite pleased to have some purple quilting cotton just lying around. Seriously. 
I free-motion quilted it - only 2nd FM project ever and the first was just place mats - using purple machine quilting thread. (if you look very closely you will see where I did some wavy quilting down each strip - I'm slowly picking that out as I don't like it) It doesn't show up much but it was fun and I love purple. Oh, and the gecko - when I first posted the pic and called it Aruba Waves, my friend said it did remind her of Aruba but was missing the gecko. 
So I laid it aside for quite a while (and a move and family disaster along the way) until I remembered one odd night that I HAD the gecko - on the t-shirt I bought in ....wait for it.... ARUBA! It's quilted with warm and natural, I believe. That stuff makes my nose itch until it's all done so I need to find another batting for the next round. It made a nice TV watching quilt - not too hot and a good size. It would be too small for a bed, though approaching twin sized.
Beautiful quilt, BeeBee.
ReplyDeleteKarendee