First Quilt of 2013

Here's the making of a quilt that I have completed as part of a challenge on the Bumblebeans / 15 minutes Play blog (it's a great blog - please pop over and have a look - it's a lot of fun) Victoris sent the challenge fabric out (all the way from New York) to a dozen or more people like mysef in order to try and make something lovely out of it. Sort of like a silk purse from a sow's ear....but I happen to really like this sow's ear!!

I might add that quite a few of the fabrics were not quilting cotton, lots were polycotton, especially the shirting, and I think the final border too. I love using a mixture of fabrics and also I couldn't find my rotary cutter over Christmas so alot are scissor cut or...torn.

Here we go!! I loved the challenge fabric , so cut a big square from it, retaining the roses. I had 2 fat quarters of zingy Michael Miller fabrics that I've been waiting for the right moment for....here cometh the HOUR . I auditioned many fabrics and shapes but loved the idea of the roses being the centre of a star.

Next I cut up lots of stripey shirt pieces to 'make' some lights to form a star and used very dark striped black and green to form the points....OH NO!! TOO dark

So i softened the points with made fabric from the photo below....

I added tarten to the left-over scraps of the challenge fabric

Now that's more pleasing to the eye. And YES if the Quilt Police are watching...it is a Wonky Star...a very wonky star

Next I added the second of the Michael Miller fabrics as a border together with random squares inserted of the first one and added some fussy cut cornerstones edged in the tarten. You'll note I'm constantly trying to get a couple of my favourite fabrics of the moment in...but it wasn't to be

Lastly, a bit more chequered shirt 'upcycled' fabric - emphasising the points of the star, with a little whimsical change of colour in the bottom right corner -  and a border of a red/blue cotton just waiting for a day like today.

I think that I'll put a scrappy light binding around it, with a hint of an inch of black here and there. But I've LOVED doing this ..THANK YOU Victoria, I love a challenge and this will make a great Linus Quilt for a little star child out there. Put together with love, with a 12" square from New York and pieced with the bonniest of scottish tarten!!

102_1164, a photo by julie wyer on Flickr.