Marion's Miscellaneous Musings: Complicated Quilts Require Complicated Stories.

Saturday, April 01, 2023

Complicated Quilts Require Complicated Stories.

Two years ago, when I finished this Lone Star (8 by 8 diamonds, 15 different fabrics) with at least 90% points matching, I felt that I had reached the epitome of quilting. Sure, there were other techniques to learn, but this required precision piecing and I had conquered that.

Then I realized that I did have something else: the Dahlia Quilt, with curved seams. So I started playing around with it in my mind.

I made Jack pick the colors, since we started having disagreements about that. How can I be married to him for 40 years and not know that he disliked turquoise? So, he picks yellow, which he had previously sneered at. (Well, he lets me buy expensive quilting tools, so OK.) (Plus he stopped complaining about the size of my fabric stash.)

I took it to a quilt retreat last fall, and it went together so easily it was ridiculous. The seams were not curved very much, so I almost didn't need to pin them. But I did. There were only 96 points to match (as opposed to 368 on the Lone Star), and I missed 3 of them by 3/16 of an inch, for a 97 percent match rate. It only took 2 days, and opposed to 2 weeks for the lone star.

This is important for later: Our Brazilian exchange student Yasmin, saw the dahlia when I brought it home and said they were Brazilian colors. (And has anybody ever noticed the similarity between the Brazilian flag and Washington State flag?)

The only part where it was harder was the very center. I had 16 seams coming together in a point. This means 32 layers of fabric just in the seams. It made such a cute little volcano! And that is why there is a circle of fabric in the center! (This is an old quilter's trick. If you see a fabric circle or diamond or sometimes a button, it may be hiding some pretty ugly piecing or quilting! In one case I saw, a lightning bolt hid the quilter's son's scissors experiment.)

Then to square up my circle. The directions that came with my template set said to sew two pieces of fabric together to get a 58 inch square. Then turn the edges of my circle under and sew it on top....see the outside points of the dahlia? That's 5 layers of fabric to turn under...into 10 layers. So I painstakingly drew a 53 inch half circle on the fabric and sewed it on. This is simple. If you have a surface that is about 60 by 40 inches. Which I do have, but, as many people have heard from me, I only get on the floor for my grandchildren. I also needed a 60 inch compass, which probably exists. For a price. So I made do with a 38 inch square coffee table, and a string taped to a pencil. (Note to self: buy tape that isn't ripped by a string.)

And it miraculously lay flat!

About this time, the quilt guild is asking for quilts to be submitted for its local show. So I asked Jodi, my quilter (it does sound like she belongs to me) when I would have to deliver it in order to get it back in time for the show. The answer is March 6. So I proceed to make 76 flying geese for the next border (The anal retentive among you will notice that there are only 56 in the border) and start the next border.

Along comes February 16, the deadline for registering quilts. This was quilt number 363, 8 hours before registration ends. They like to have over 400. So I entered it. I still needed to finish the piano key border and make 28 12 inch flower blocks. Entirely doable, especially because there was another quilt retreat the weekend of March 2-5, which meant sewing all day every day.

I decided to make 4 of each flower block -- and, because Yasmin had said they were Brazilian colors -- 4 soccer balls. And then I figured out that I only needed to make 24 12 inch blocks! Even better! So I went off to the retreat with 8 blocks to go and 2 soccer balls that needed fixing. The second to last flower block to some time to put together. The last one I sewed together ALL four wrong, and spent 40 minutes fixing only one, ending at 10 pm Friday night. Things were not looking good. Talking to Jodi, she said she didn't actually need it until Friday the 10th.

I dislike pressure, so I put the quilt on time out and instead worked on a couple of community service quilts for the rest of the weekend. Happily, I might add.

Jack and Yasmin said that last flower block didn't look like a flower, and they liked it better sewn together wrong anyway. So, by the end of Sunday the 5th, I had resigned myself to not putting the quilt in this years show.

Then I had a revelation: the only reason I needed flower blocks is because I wrote it on the quilt description for the show, and who reads those anyway? (I was in charge of putting them on the quilts just before the show, so I could always put it above everyone's eye level. Problem solved!) So I spent Monday making a Jacob's ladder (for Jack), a Marion's Choice block (for me), an Exploding Sawtooth Star (because). Those 20 extra flying geese? 18 of them went into a Wild Goose Chase block. Which this was beginning to feel like anyway. I put the two good soccer balls in and two flower/non-flower blocks in. I had the whole quilt together by Wednesday the 8th.

I delivered it to Jodi, and told her if she ran into problems not to worry about completing it on time. I needed it back on Monday the 20th so I could put the binding on.

The first problem we ran into was the backing, a 108 wide piece than shrunk a few inches after washing. My quilt was 98 by 98 inches. I told her I could piece the back with the leftover blocks I had. But we didn't need to worry about that after all.

She ran out of one thread, and, by calling around, discovered that it was discontinued. On Thursday, March 16, she advertised for it on several platforms. Someone saw it, called a friend who called a friend who was on the Oregon Coast. This person called her husband, who found it in her stash. Her husband gave it to friend number 2, who got it to Jodi Friday the 17th. Jodi had a previous commitment on Saturday the 18th, but she finished the quilt on Sunday the 19th. (She ended up meeting both of them at the quilt show, so the whole circle of life thing is complete.)

I TOLD her not to worry. She never obeys me anyway.

I finished the binding on Tuesday at 9:00 pm, so Jack and Yasmin were available to hold it up for a picture I could put on the label. And here it is!