I love it when I am given someone else's unfinished project. I can use their original idea and continue down the same road, or go off on a tangent. If there is a way to complete it, I'm all in!
Most recently I was given a quilt top that was made with a Halloween "scaredy cat" style design, in shades of black, brown and beige. The cats were all hand stitched, so clearly there was a load of time invested in it, although I don't think that they followed a pattern. If there was a pattern used, I wonder if the creator was a beginner and was unable to understand the instructions? Or maybe they were more experienced and decided to go out on their own once the cats were completed? It will forever be a mystery, since I don't know who started this project.....
The cat blocks seemed to have some markings on the back for seam allowances and were a consistent size (maybe from a kit?), however the half rectangle triangles (HRT's) were ALL wonky. Not one was the same size as the next and the cutting was not straight on ANY of the sides:
With the blocks already stitched together, the seam allowances were a shambles. The larger blocks (with the cats) were stitched at different width to the HRT's. Just look at the side seams! The corners!! The wavy edges!!! Nope, this will not be salvageable, unless I unpick the blocks and start again........
Spent about 4 hours with the unpicker - yes, 4 hours! Whoever made this used a stitch that was super tiny and I had to ensure that I preserved as much fabric as I could, so had to take extra care. They backstitched every seam (which is a big no-no in quilting) and some seams were stitched twice due to fabric not being caught enough in the original seams and they tried to correct the issue by just taking a larger seam. This explains why none of the seams match....
Finally, they are all apart. YAY! Time to get them pressed and starched.
Ah, that's better ;)
Now, to check what is going on with these blocks and find out why they are not going together nicely.
Looking at the smallest block, the finished size was closest to 8" x 10":
The cat blocks were all larger than this size, so easiest solution is to trim them down to match the smallest block.
To make it easier, I made a template with a window that was large enough to see the the entire cat design, so its easy to confirm that it is centred correctly, then trimmed to this size.
I used some painters tape to hold in place while trimming:
Now, this is progress!!
Once all the blocks have been trimmed, its time to work out a new layout. The original layout was setup so that the light colour was always to the top right, but I was not feeling it:
After playing around with the layout, it seemed to work better if the darks created a central diagonal stripe. Since each block is unique, the perfect layout took quite a bit of tweaking to get the balance right. I think I have it? Not sure, but gonna go with it anyway.....
All stitched together and its looking heaps better but is missing something.....
A border would help to square up the edges that still had some minor issues. I tested several different colours and styles, but found a black with muted white dots was the best fit from the fabric I had on hand:
And that's a wrap for the top.
The person that donated this top had also planned the backing - a cute Kauffman print with kitty's all over it. I will use this since it was part of the original plan - I just hope there is enough, now that the top is larger than the original. I need to check this, but first, I need to sort out my filling - wadding or flannelette? Gonna need a trip to Spotty's, methinks.....
Decided to go with flannelette for the filler to make it more of a knee rug weight than a bed quilt. Made sure that it was pre-washed, to reduce the chances of it shrinking too much after it is washed.
Adding the borders to the top made it much larger for the kitty fabric to use on its own, but I don't want to discount it entirely. Stash hunting again, I found a nice tartan style check that I could use to make up the difference. Cut a couple of strips to use on the side and bottom to bring the kitty fabric up to size. Now to setup all my layers and to decide on how to quilt it.
Decided to echo quilt around each cat, then each side of the diagonal and inside the perimeter of all blocks. Simple and not too dense.
Now, checking the size of the backing, I wondered if I could just do a self binding? This would remove the need to trim and cut new binding strips - I just need to do some math to make sure I don't trim too much 'cause there is no going back once it is trimmed off (other than going back to a normal binding, that is...)
Testing for a nice double fold, I trimmed the top and batting only, making sure that the backing was left intact. Trimmed backing to 3cm, so folded to the raw edge, then folded over and top stitched by machine for a finished 1.5cm binding effect on the front.
Yep, I think this is going to work :)
Test fold to raw edge:
Fold again to create binding:
Pin, then stitch it down:
And she is done, baby! Yeah!!
Love the eyes that appeared occasionally on the binding ;)
