Spontaneous Threads quilt finish..

This quilt comes from Stephanie of Spontaneous threads. Pretty amazing huh? Love the orange and gray. The more I see orange around makes me like it more and more! I love the scrappness and wonkiness of this quilt. Quilt finish gorgeousness here... Be sure to check out Spontaneous threads blog for more inspiration!


The Perfect Storm- for me that is…..

"Tail Wind" original design and quilting by- Stephanie Zacharer Ruyle
(photo: Marta Strzeszewski, photo editing by Amy Gibson- she photoshopped out the hands!)

It doesn't happen very often-that unique combination of circumstances and ideas (old and new), but it happened just recently to me and if I can get all the stars and planets to align (ya, right) I might be on to something.

Let me begin at the beginning, I have had this quilt for as long as I can remember.

It's faded in some areas, and the binding is frayed but it still retains it's beauty and it's simplicity

It's very old, very soft and very fragile. I don't know who made it, but it's totally made by hand. Cut, pieced and quilted without any electricity what-so-ever.

These small orange squares are 1" in size. Look at that tiny, uniform hand stitching.

I have always loved this quilt and wish I knew more about the person who made it. Besides it's mysterious creator, one thing that always makes me smile is it's color. It's orange and white- sunny and bright. Someone once told me that they thought it was probably not orange but red and that it has faded with time and use. But I disagree, something tells me it's always been orange (faded red to me is pink) and that makes me smile all the more.  I'm guessing 100+ years ago, orange wasn't a popular color, let alone the color of the year, like Tangerine Tango is this year, but someone liked it enough to make a quilt with orange proudly displayed. Which got me thinking that in 2012, I NEEDED to make a quilt for myself. (I haven't yet you see). Then along came the Tangerine Tango challenge…….

and the MQG challenge and a January FRMQG meeting and I got to thinking, perhaps these are just the push, my proverbial "Tail Wind".

So, here is MY story
Title: Tail Wind
Start: mid-January, 2012- completed: mid-February 2012

Tail Wind-the front

The back

Size: 95" x90" (Queen sized)
FMQ: (on my Bernina 180) using: a FMQ pattern of tailed-swirls and fillers to resemble "wind" currents originating from a centrally placed compass rose.

Thread: Coats and Clarks 100% quilting cotton in winter white, 40 weight.  I used well over 2000 yards of thread to quilt this project.
Batting: Hobbs Tuscany Collection, 100% wool batting which needs to be quilted every 3".
Material, 100% cotton- (front):
     1. Oranges:(mainly from stash and small yardage approximately FQ size and smaller) 5 Kona "orange family" solids (3 little pieces left over from the Robert Kaufman solids challenge charm pack in brights); Kona solids in school bus and coral; Kaffe Fassett- Rowan Line Dance; OZ by Sanae for Moda; Floralicious by Michael D'Amore for Benartex; Taza by Dena for free Spirit; Woodland Friends by Ellen Crimi-Trent for Clothworks, Half Moon by Moda; Grad Bazaar by Patty Young for Michael Miller; Metro Living Circles by Robert Kaufman; Fresh Flowers by Deb Strain for Moda; Garden Divas by Jane Sassaman for Free Spirit; A day in the Life by Mummysan for Robert Kaufman, Aviary 2 by Joel Dewberry for Free Spirit; Innocent Crush Maybe by Anna Maria Horner for Free Spirit; Treasures and Tidbits by Piece O' Cake Designs for Robert Kaufman; Tonal Kaleidoscope Gypsy Bandana by Pillow & Maxfield for Michael Miller;  Aldo fo Zippy by Jenn Ski/Lilla Rogers Studio for P&B Textiles; Kensington Studio for Quilting Treasures; Simon + Kabuki for Eandl Design, Inc.; Terrain by Kate Spain for Moda; Mingle by Monaluna for Robert Kaufman; and various wonderful orange scraps from Michelle L. (Flickr- I like Orange too) from the Goodie Bag swap (round 2).

     2. Grays:(mainly from stash and small yardage as above) Kona medium grey; "Quilters Linen" by Robert Kaufman,  Metro Living Circles by Robert Kaufman; Alexander Henry Fashion for Home; Little Apples by Aneela Hoey for Moda; Ta Dot by Michael Miller, and small scraps from Michelle L. (Flickr- I like Orange too).

 Material(back):
     1. Oranges: (mainly from stash and small yardage as above) Aldo fo Zippy by Jenn Ski/Lilla Rogers Studio for P&B Textiles; Heirloom by Joel Dewberry for Free Spirit
     2. Turquoise: (small yardage from stash)Treetop Fancy by Tina Givens for Free Spirit; Night Sky by Tina Givens for Free Spirit

"Neutral", (front and back): Kona Snow approximately 12-13 yards

For this quilt, I used:
Front: small pieced squares (5 1/2") 85 total- (80 orange, 5 gray)
          medium pieced squares (10 1/2") 26 total- (19 orange, 7 gray)
          medium kona snow solid 10 1/2" squares- 7
          small kona snow solid 5 1/2" squares- 16
          rectangle kona snow solid 10 1/2 x 5 1/2"- 10
Back: large pieced squares 15" 3 total (2 turquoise, 1 orange)
          small pieced squares 5 1/2" total 3 (2 orange and 1 turquoise)
          pieced kona solid in Snow

The quilt top pieces were laid out in a random pattern based mainly on what appealed to me.

One note of caution, and I should have foreseen this had I (been organized and) drawn this out in advance; was……... the piecing of the top became puzzle-like containing only one width of quilt straight seam line (yikes).

I lay my quilts out on the floor as I don't have a design "wall".  If you look closely at about 9 o'clock you can see a large grouping of quilt blocks with no obvious (to me) way to assemble them without some creative and non-linear piecing.

In the end I was left with about 7 medium sized sections and had quite the time fitting them all together in an orderly manner.

It required (quite) a bit of interesting seaming but it all eventually went together.

The completed top laying over the backing and the 100% wool batting, all taped to the living room floor and waiting to be pin-basted.

 I did lean my lesson when it came to the back! (minimal and straight piecing).

quilting in progress- Bernina 180 and a small Sew EZ portable sewing table

What I love about this quilt is that I used many, many oranges and some (but not as many) grays. If you look closely you can see birds, bees, flowers, dots, zig-zags, spiders, sinks, a bath tub, a whisk, a dress, eye glasses, a baby carriage, a toaster, a door, a piece of cake, utensils, lots of scissors, a toy car, stripes, checks, plaid, argyll, fish scales, words, leaves, rosebuds, ducks and hats. I'd say that's quite a collection of things to see and to look for, and all of that just makes me smile.

The quilting is really prominent on the back and I'm thrilled that I used so much neutral here.

Back, detail

                                             

Back- close-up of  FM quilting

In the end I have a beautiful and surprisingly light-weight queen sized quilt. Although the wool batting requires denser quilting, it's incredibly light, compressible and easy to maneuver under the space available on a regular table top sewing machine.

Many Thanks to my FRMQG members for helping me take full-length photos
The front (photo: Marta Strzeszewski)

The back
(photo Marta Strzeszewski)