All done!

No quilt is considered all done to me until it has been photographed and posted online, so although I finished stitching the binding on my zigzag quilt last weekend, it wasn't until the weather cleared enough today so I could snap a few pictures for a bit of show-and -tell that I really felt I was at the end of this labour of love. It seems to have taken me forever to stitch. After I chose the fabrics and tried to create a pleasing arrangement where the colours from one would run gradually into another, I needed a while to ho and hum about it, before I had to make a couple of them go. That meant that the quilt ended up narrower than I wanted, so I had to find some border fabric. I found that black worked well, if it had some tan or brown in it, making it a bit warmer. But wouldn't you know it - years ago when I was trying to find pure black fabric, the only ones I could find had lots of tan or brown in them, but this year all the blacks seem to have grey in them, making them too harsh for this project. Eventually I came across a piece in a bargain bin which was just right, though, and the top was finished. Then, wouldn't you know it, the backing fabric I had in mind was too small... I was considering this issue, when my gaze fell upon the discarded triangles from the end of the zig zag strips, and started playing around with them. Before you knew it they became blocks, and there I had my solution: I would include some borders and the discarded fabrics that were meant for the front and make an interesting backing as well. The rest should be easy... Well, it wasn't too complicated, but I decided I would quilt it in lines following the zig zag pattern. And being such a clever clogs, I decided that it was much quicker to do this by machine than quilting by hand. It didn't occur to me that I would have a plus size quilt on my hands where I needed to stop every four inches and turn the whole thing 90 degrees. Well, I can tell you - it was rather time consuming... After a while I got bored, so towards one side I started making the lines gradually less angled, ending with wavy lines on the black border. On the other side, I let my quilting lines shoot out towards the edge to create smaller areas to be filled in with stitching. It ended up quite densely quilted, but it has retained its soft drapey feel, and at 66 x 95" it has become a lovely quilt to snuggle under on a chilly autumn evening. And when I toss it aside, there's that interesting backing to look at as well. Now it's time for a little rest while I consider what my next project will be.