Friday 26 October 2012

Bloggers' Quilt Festival - Winter Windows

Thank you for stopping by! I'm Emma, I live in Adelaide, South Australia, and I started quilting about 18 years ago, in my teens. I don't really have a set style (who needs labels?!); I do a bit of everything - as long as it's quilting! And I like to do everything myself, from the designing and construction to the quilting and finishing. I'm even getting into a bit of fabric painting.

Regular readers here will have seen this quilt before, as it was recently published in Australian Patchwork & Quilting magazine, and I was able to share it at last. But I've decided to make it my BQF entry, because I'm so proud of the quilting - which I did entirely on my domestic sewing machine; a Bernina 820.


The quilt top itself is simple enough; I added a few borders to some star blocks which I'd made the wrong size for another quilt and threw them together with a couple of borders. But I decided to make the quilting the real feature and really went to town; adding loads of details and creating secondary patterns. I made a deliberate decision to try and keep it relatively modern, with no feathers for a change!

(full back view)

Apart from a few structural lines done with the walking foot (e.g. the triangles in the borders), it's all free-motion quilted, using white and pale aqua BottomLine thread by Superior.


I created my own template to mark some parts, marked others freehand (both with a Sewline air erasable marker, which vanished beautifully on its own) and quilted others totally freehand.

(detail of the back)

The extra depth to the quilting is provided by a double-layer of batting, which gets difficult to manipulate on a domestic sewing machine, but is certainly effective.


I did try to track the hours involved in quilting this, but lost count. I estimate somewhere in the vicinity of 30 hours on the quilting alone. More photos and details blogged here.

Quilt statistics:
Size: 53 x 66in
Uses foundation-piecing, double-batting, free-motion quilting
Best Category: Home machine quilted quilt
Designed, pieced and quilted by: me
Completed: May 2012
Published in Australian Patchwork & Quilting Vol 21 No 11

Thank you for visiting! I do hope you'll pop back sometime and have a look at my other quilts.

Other quilts and their stories entered in the current Bloggers' Quilt festival can be found here.

33 comments:

Karen said...

Your quilt is wonderful. I love the colours and the quilting is stunning!
Beautiful work.

Sheila said...

love everything about it, the quilting is a work of art

PaintedThread said...

Wow! That quilting is unreal! The piecing is beautiful, too.

Anonymous said...

Your quilting is absolutely stunning! I would have never guessed this was done on a home machine. It's just perfect!

Mary said...

The best part is saying, "I did it all myself"!!

Sylvia said...

The quilting really enhances your quilt! Well done!

Alison V. said...

This quilt is so gorgeous! Your quilting is absolutely impecable! :)

sherry said...

the quilt takes my breath away

CitricSugar said...

You quilted that on a home sewing machine????? Holy wow.

It's absolutely gorgeous.

Marjorie said...

Absolutely fantastic. Great use of pattern and space. Thanks for sharing.

Dresden Quilter said...

You always amaze me with your creations. It is stunningly beautiful!

LethargicLass said...

stunning. absolutely stunning.

Gretchen said...

Your quilting is amazing!

Sunshine Girl said...

Wow this is stunning - I only tried free motion quilting for the first time this week and was amazed how long it took! Thanks for sharing.

Calicojoan said...

Beautiful color, beautiful pattern, stellar quilting. What a treasure!

Lisa said...

Wow, your quilting is fantastic. I'm very impressed.

Mom said...

Pretty-Pretty, as usual :-)

Η Πευκοβελόνα said...

I have absolutely no words for your machine quilting. It is amazing...hope I get to this level someday. #76

Rene' said...

Stunning! I love how the backing showcases the beautiful quilting!!!! Congratulations on such a fabulous quilt!

Diane Wild said...

Your FMQ is stunning. What a beautiful job.

Lyanna L. said...

stunning quilting. i can't get over how you did this on your bernina!! Great job!

bevkimmel said...

Very beautiful. Thanks for sharing some tips on how you did this. Some day I hope to be able to do so well myself!!

Denise SA said...

It's so beautiful I love the colours and am in awe of the quilting

tusen said...

The quilting is absolutely stunning!

Anonymous said...

Amazing quilting!

MalinisQuilts said...

Your quilting is stunning!
Very impressed!

Sarcastic Quilter said...

Fabulous quilt and quilting!

Eileen said...

Beautiful quilt and your quilting is gorgeous! Thanks for sharing and have a great day

Camilla said...

Outstanding quilting! Well deserved finals placing!

Sandra said...

wow, great quilt and stunning quilting. Kudos

Come see my Batik Tulips #46

and my antique zigzag-a-licious quilt #23

Anonymous said...

Wow! I love the quilting on this one so I voted for it. I'm the one sponsoring the prize for this category so I hope you win!

Annieofbluegables said...

I voted for you of course. I was looking carefully at each quilt until I came to yours, and hands down, yours wins.
~a

Books_Bound said...

Wow. The quilting on this is a-mazing! I have a Bernina 930...but my quilting looks nothing like yours, to say the least! It boggles my mind that people can do this! Incredible work.