My first bed-size quilt

This project is all about working with what I already had on hand.  I had to get a bit creative in the block size and backing due to the amounts of fabric I had on hand, but it can be done!


I used the pattern "Modern Maze" from the book 'Modern Basics' by Amy Ellis.  I ended up shortening the squares down to 12" from 12.5 and adding a border to create the exact size I needed for the bed, while working with the varied amounts of fabric I had.

Long story short, here's what I've been up to the past few days:

Thursday, I picked out these 3 fabrics that I really love and always keep different shades of in my stash.  I then paired them with the orange you see in the upper left corner.  They blend well in the quilt, although I'll be honest and say that if I were going to actually purchase the final color for the quilt, I would have used another gray, it's my favorite color and has a more modern look that matches the house.  While nice, this quilt will end up being a bit more "happy" and springy, not as "mod" as I had hoped.  But, I like it still...

After getting all the cutting done on Thursday, i was able to get all the piecing done on Friday.  Lest you think I am really energetic, I want you to see my new setup for pinning the squares into rows....

Kids in bed, movie on Netflix, wine glass on the right and a felted board on my lap for pinning, see? - I'm not really as ambitious as I seem sometimes :)

I think I'll call this quilt "By the skin of my teeth" - look at how little fabric was left after trimming 35 12" squares... not much room for error, eh?  If you don't sew or quilt, just know that this is NOT good, I'm actually very, very lucky this time.

Saturday I finished sewing all the rows and columns together, pressing all the seams on the back of the quilt top flat

Here is the pattern before quilting the top

Lacking the massive amount of backing fabric needed (5-6 yards), I chose this bedsheet instead!  It has the same colors but different pattern totally, but the content was right at a low thread count (quilting fabric is NOT high thread count and needles have a hard time punching through those nice soft bedsheets). Due to that low thread count it wasn't being used as a sheet, so voila! - improvisational quilt backing.  Bonus is that it will essentially be a reversible quilt when I'm done.

Saturday night was time to sandwich the quilt.  A must is to start with a swiffer, since this evolution is done on the floor due to the size of the quilt.

Backing fabric (sheet) taped to the floor

Batting goes on top of that, then the quilt top - then the whole sandwich is basted together to avoid shifting during the actual quilting process.  For newbies, a quilt isn't actually "a quilt" until it is sandwiched and all layers are stitched together in a pattern of sorts - the top is called "patchwork".

And yes, I use pins for basting instead of needle and thread...it's much easier for me

Above is the quilt sandwich on the floor, covered in basting pins, this process took about 2 hours Saturday night as I was also having to shoo children away and take care of laundry as well.

And chasing dogs away...

They seemed to think it was their new bed, and didn't seem to mind laying on a bunch of pins

Today's job is the actual quilting, this involves a plain grid stitch for me, it's "easy" but extremely long, boring, back aching work - but when this part is finished is when it really starts to look like a quilt and not just a starchy flat piece of fabric!

Here is where I'll be the rest of the day today, tonight, and probably tomorrow.  After this part all that is left is the binding, and that is the hardest part for me, I'm hoping someday I'll "get it" without the book in front of me and I'll start to look forward to this finishing step as I gain more experience.

Luckily, I'm not missing a thing outside, it's cold and blustery - weather report called for snow today but it is 36º outside so we are getting sleet all day, brrrrrr!  Hard to imagine now that it was 82º this time last week!