eXtra

The first block or few of my latest quilt were made only as a test. You know, to decide if it was worth making more. I decided yes! I was using Kona Rich Red and Black from stash, but all the other fabrics came straight from the solid scrap bin. In time, I'd make about 35 blocks in several sizes. All but the largest gold one made it into the finished quilt.

It ended up I had too many blocks to make my original quasi-plan work, so I switched to more of a block-based quilt design than my norm. But the layout intrigued me, knowing I'd fill in with more solid black, so for better or worse, I just went for it.

There was definitely some puzzling involved, but it was fun puzzling as opposed to stressful puzzling. Haha. But before I knew it, I had a quilt top! 

For a quilt back, I found two yards of American Jane's Pez print, which I know had been waiting in the ole stash for several years. The colors were perfect for this quilt, so since I couldn't remember why I'd been hoarding it, I happily put it to use. I paired it with two smaller pieces of Kimberly Kight's Grid, and was pretty pleased with the result.

For quilting, I used two Aurifil 50wt threads - #2975 [Brass] for the majority of the stitching of both straight line and 'fancy' zig zags across the quilt - and #2250 [Red] for a few lines in each column just for fun. 

Bound in Kona Black, the finished quilt measures 48" x 58", and even though it wasn't where I thought I was going when I started out, it was an enjoyable process. I especially enjoyed playing with a new block design, as well as using all those colorful scraps. Plus, that Fancy Straight Line quilting from Jacquie Gering's Walk book is always fun to execute and gives great results. I keep reminding myself that my quilt creations can be whatever I want them to be!

So just in the nick of time, I had a quilt finish for July. We happened to have a weekend visitor while I was finishing up this project, and true to form, he totally ignored the quilt until I went and roller brushed it to get the batting lint off. Then suddenly it was bath time. Gotta love it!