When One Isn't Enough

I make two!  Doesn't that make sense?

I wanted to play a bit on the long arm.  Having looked at lots of amazing whole cloth quilts on various blogs, websites and pinterest, I had a hankering to create.  So, I loaded some white muslin, bits of batting and a white linen that I know I won't be wearing.  I get dirty too easily to wear a sparkling white anything.  Well, I have pulled it off with white tees, but those are fairly cheap and easily replaced.  But to make something beautiful and then wear it for all of an hour till it's ruined just doesn't seem right.  So, whole cloth quilt to the rescue it became.

I started out with the idea of tracing a drawing I'd made several months ago, but that became tedious really quick.  I'd much rather to do my quilting freehand.


Of course, I can't draw as well on fabric with the long-arm as on paper with a pencil in hand.  That said, I had to improvise by using the drawing as a guide for the larger motifs.  I used a fabric pen to mark some of the motifs on the fabric.  After I quilted the flowers and feathers, I filled in the open spaces with circles that remind me of pebbles.

Quilting in the pebbles took a good bit of time, but I love the end result. The large motifs pop up almost like trapunto.  I found though that I still had lots of fabric and couldn't see a way to add more of the motifs without distorting the shape and size that I started with.  



Rather than just stop there and have fabric left, I drew a line to help me see the edge of the first quilt and free hand quilted another whole cloth piece.  

For the second quilt, I repeated some of the flower motifs, but focused mostly on free hand feathers.  I also left the open spaces alone.  The second quilt is also quite a bit smaller, and a great size for a table runner.  I've decided to save it for the next time I need a wedding gift.  The large quilt, will make a beautiful table topper for a special occasion, such as Christmas.  I imagine it on the table with a red tablecloth under it.