A Family Quilt

I was quested with making a very special family quilt. It was to be gifted to the mother of the family for her 70th birthday! It was such an honor to create this quilt, and I hope it is enjoyed very muchly!

I learnt a lot through the process. I taught myself some new techniques (yep, very brave of me) and experienced commission work to a brief. I found a lot of things I can improve on for next time, but I am ecstatic with the finished product!

The original concept. It changed a bit, with new things being added and changed!

I honestly can not tell you its dimensions, I was too keen to send it off on its next adventure to take the time to measure it. I did make sure I got some photos of it, I’m notoriously bad for not documenting my quilts before I gift them!

It was made from quilters cottons. I used a lot of batiks, I really liked the movement and colours they bought to the overall design. Deep purples and greens were the requested colour choice 🙂

I used vlisofix to attach the appliques, I then used free motion quilting to stitch them down. I had experimented with free motion stitching at a very basic level some years ago, this was a massive stepping stone and I’m so glad I gave it a go! I love the results.

I used the technique of “quilt as you go” to put the quilt together. This meant that each square was individually quilted BEFORE it was sewn together, unlike in a traditional quilt where you sew the top together and then quilt it. I then used “tram ways” (the purple borders) to stitch it all together.

Pretty much the entire quilt was sewn on the machine. The only hand stitching was a few stitches for the badgers eye. I also hand stitched a label on the back so a message could be added before gifting.

I sourced or drew the appliques. Each block represents a different family member. I used black thread to out line the image, grey thread in the back ground and some blocks have a colour thread for any objects in the background as well.