Why was I so afraid of linen?

Ok, I was afraid of cutting my Echino, and I think that's obvious. 17$/yard? Brrr.... I doubt there's anybody who can't understand this :))) And I was afraid the linen will strech a lot and I won't be able to quilt it with straight lines.

After a discussion on the Flickr modern quilts group, I was ready to start.



The quilting went extremly smooth. Really, I couldn't belive it. I pinned very lightly, about 30 pins on the entire quilt. I figured it will strech a lot and I'll just leave it strech and see how it goes, adjust on the way. It was perfect!

The only tiny little poblem was that my last puple strip was smaller. About 1 cm on one side and almost 2 on the other one. And I noticed this after I quilted and cut the edges. Well, just a perfect place to put a tag.

Really, can you tell this was not on purpse? I love it! (ok, learn romanian lesson 2 - poarta-ma means wear me)

Another thing I love about this quilt is that I really wanted to use all the scraps. And even if I didn't have enough to make a rectangle (they all have the same dimensions) I still did it, with a little solid linen. And I think it looks great, completes the echino prints very well.

The blocks I made here are, for now, my favorites. I think I was really inspired by Melody Miller's Ruby Star Rising. I just didn't have the funds for her fabrics now (one Kokka per half year is enough for me :( ) but when I look at this quilt I think about her.

I had a lot of troubles choosing the back and the binding, but I think they complete they 60's look pretty good. And I'm always a sucker for the straight line quilting on the back.

It has about 100 x 160 cm, and I loooooove it. If only it wasn't a comisioned quilt and I wouldn't have payed the Echino :))))...




P.S. Obviously, my batting is here. Finally!

My first linen - WIP

My batting is still not here, nor the white kona, and we all caught a nasty virus and sew nothing this week. So I was thinking to tell you a little story about how I make a quilt. And that's how 90% of my quilts are done. I have no ideea what dimension it's going to have when I start and I rarely have an ideea about how the quilt is going to look in the end. Most of the times I just play :)

No, I don't have a design wall. And truth be told, I don't even have a stash :D That's all my designer fabric stash :D

Anyway, last week I decided to cut my Echino scraps. I use Echino for MeiTais (if you're new to babywearing or know nothing about, you must check thebabywearer. Or go visit my romanian site and understand nothing :)) ) and I had very few scraps that I kept safely for a quilt :).

I started with this quilt in my mind. It was another immage but I seem to foget to bookmark a lot these days :D.

First of all I must say that in a very mysterious way I decided I need 13" blocks. Really, I have no.ideea.at.all how did I get to that 13.

Anyway, I than decided I don't want to chop my scraps too much, like I needed for that kind of pattern, so I decided to make 6,5" squares. Ha! 6,5" suck. Really :) They looked horrible. And 4 squares block?

Not really.

Ok, maybe 2 squares in solid and 2 in print?

Neah

Maybe 4 squares block on the middle and than 2 squares block on the sides?

Maybe

Neah, not now

Later on I realised I must use that linen so I decided to cut the squares in two rectangles (3,25" yes?) and make a quilt in the same pattern and style as Rita's chaos quilt.

Layed everything down and ... hmmm ... let's just say ...

no.

Finnaly, the block. The good one. Did you folow? I said 3 1/4" x 6 1/2" rectangles. What dimension is this? Anybody?

Ok, so the block. I then remebered I cried a little last week when my natural Kona arrived. And I so hated it. Not white, not gray, but a natural that doesn't fit any fabric in my stash. Until now. Mu-ha-ha :)))

The blocks sashed in natural looked unexpectedly (:P) good.

Than some border with the rest of 3 1/4" x 6 1/2" rectangles. (I like to write it down, it looks so complicated :D).

See that last strip? It was supposed to be the last...Not after this...

Anyway, I am thinking about adding more horizontal stripes. I think I will have a lot of time to think about this until my batting arives :))) And than I'll show you the quilt. Of course, after I take a deep breath and do some straight line quilting on linen...