My Larger Quilts

On this page:

Love Fans
Round the Twist
Blooming Nine-Patch
Doggie Brick Road
Out of Darkness

I haven't made many bed-sized quilts. I seem to have more use for either lap quilts or wall quilts, since I can't keep our various dogs off the beds! Besides, I have more walls than beds. ;)

Love Fans

This is the first large quilt I made. It is a Grandmother's Fan pattern set in love rings, or rings radiating out from the center.It is in shades of lavender, because my husband's favorite color is purple. Each machine-pieced fan block is hand quilted with hearts, and the whole thing was lap quilted, following Georgia Bonesteel's ideas. The quilt was finished in early 1988, over two years after I began it, and is big enough to drop to the floor on a queen-sized bed, measuring 95" x 114". Unfortunately, it's seen some hard use in the past few years and is now in pretty bad condition -- it didn't help that the fabrics weren't the best quality! Lesson learned: always get the best fabrics possible.

Round the Twist

This quilt was finished in early 1992, approximately two years after beginning it (two years is a long time; that's another reason why I haven't made many large quilts!). This was the first project I hand quilted as a whole, rather than lap quilting (though I machine pieced), mainly because the rows were set on the bias and I was afraid of stretching the quilt. Each of the larger, plain blocks has a feathered wreath quilted into it. This one measures 85" x 99".

Blooming Nine-Patch

I needed a new quilt for my queen-sized bed, and I love this pattern, so this was an easy decision. What wasn't so easy was deciding on the fabrics to use, especially since I wanted to use ten fabrics, rather than the eight in the original pattern. Thanks to the help from a couple of RCTQ members (thanks Susan M and Nancy!), I had revised measurements to consult and lots of very good tips. I bought the fabric for this in late 2001 with help from a very artistic friend, but I didn't start making it until October, 2002, because I found out that Blanche Young (the originator of the pattern) would be in town for a class in this very pattern! I finished the top in late November, 2002, and did something I'd never done before -- I took it to a long-arm quilter instead of quilting it myself. It was so large that I didn't want to wrestle with it to machine quilt it, and it was too busy to benefit from hand quilting, so that left a commercial quilter as my choice. She did a gorgeous job with it, getting it back to me in early April, 2003, so that I could bind it and put a label on it. Here's a detail of the quilting:

She did a lovely job, didn't she? The quilt measures 95 1/2" x 105 1/2" and was entirely machine pieced. Now it's on our bed, where it belongs!

Doggie Brick Road

I've been collecting dog fabrics for several years now, with absolutely no idea of how I was going to use them. However, so many people were raving over how much fun they were having making Yellow Brick Road quilts that I decided that this might be just what I was looking for. I figured out the measurements I'd need to make one in a double-bed size and set to work. I cut out my fabrics on a Friday afternoon, machine pieced the top (minus borders) over the next few days, and finally put the almost-finished top on the bed I'd intended it for on Wednesday evening. After that, I slowed down a bit and finally finished the machine quilting and binding at the end of May, 2003. I had a lot of fun with the machine quilting, putting in lots of dog-related words, as well as dog bones and paw prints. Here's a photo of part of it:

The bed this quilt is for is in our guest room, but it's also the bed that our dogs like best to curl up on for daytime naps. They apparently approve of the quilt! :)

The quilt is machine pieced and machine quilted and measures approximately 80" x 97".

Out of Darkness

The local quilt shop sponsored a pieced block-of-the-month in 2003-2004; the patterns were designed by Pam Bono. I finished piecing the top in October, 2004; but I had absolutely no idea of how I wanted to quilt it. After debating for quite a while, a friend of mine offered to do it on her long-arm machine -- who was I to refuse? ;) She's a busy lady, so the quilt was sort of on the back burner for a while; but the waiting was worth it! She did a beautiful job on it, finishing in February, 2006. She used black thread to McTavish most of it, with cross-hatching in the center medallion section and a multi-colored butterfly just to the top right of the medallion. Here's a close-up of one part of the quilting:

Gorgeous, isn't it? The quilt measures approximately 87" x 107", and it has 3753 pieces, unless I missed counting some of them. Update: In March, 2006, this quilt won an Honorable Mention in our local quilt show! :)

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