[kleo bangle dot nine patch] Finished!

SIZE: ~ 39″ square (each patch is 13″ square)
FABRIC: kleo and bangle dot by Alexander Henry + coordinating prints
DESIGN: nine patch with off-center square in square
QUILTING: by machine; loose meandering
BINDING: Kona crimson with small scraps of the coordinating prints pieced in; machine sewn to front and back
INSPIRED BY: time! I need to get this thing completed FAST
FOR: a baby shower gift

I had just a few days notice for a baby shower and despite that decided I would make a quilt for it. This quilt came together in four afternoons (one to piece, one to baste, one to quilt and one to bind). I knew I needed to do a simple quilt and came up with a modified large-scale nine patch design.

^ back ^

On paper, I like the idea of the design. In reality and with my fabric, I don’t like how it came together. I’m discovering that there’s a disconnect between what I think will look good when I draw out the design and what actually looks good with specific fabrics.  After I had cut the Bangle Dot fabric for the nine patch on the front, I realized that the bolder Kleo (floral) fabric probably would have looked better on the front, rather than the back.

^ front detail ^

I didn’t have the fabric to fix my mistake and I didn’t want to go out and buy more fabric (and I didn’t have the time to do that), so I continued on with the quilt as is. I also should have used a bolder medium pink color in one of the 9 patches, instead of the pink plaid/gingham-ish one (you can see the fabric I’m referring to pieced into the green square in the photo above). It’s one of those quilts that I like the back better than the front, but only because I don’t like the front!

^ back detail ^

For the quilting, a did a loose meandering design. I really like how that looks and feels on the finished quilt.

For the binding I used a kona solid (crimson, I think) with scraps of the coordinating prints pieced in. I machine stitched the binding to both the front and back. I am getting better at machine stitching the binding to the back (I didn’t miss catching the fabric once) but for whatever reason, I can’t seem to sew straight. Or my binding isn’t pulled around uniformly so that is what is not straight. Either way, I wish it looked better. Actually, I really wish I was fast enough to hand stitch the binding to the back because that looks so much better than the way I machine stitch the binding to the back. However, for me, at this time, completing the quilt with a less-than-perfect binding is more important that trying to find the time to hand stitch the binding to the back (which would result in a quilt that would sit incomplete until next year).

By the time the quilt was finished (including the inaugural wash), it was dusk — pushing twilight really — so I had to quickly snap these pictures. Twilight light is really odd and gave off a weird color cast in the photos (pinkish maybe?). I tried correcting it but gave up.

In the end, I can’t believe I finished this quilt in the time I did.