Somethings About Me

Tuesday, September 8, 2020

Septe”MMM”ber Shine

It’s been awhile we’ve been home for at least a one week stretch and one of the projects I needed to finally finish was my Shine Quilt designed by Sandra (mmm quilts).  The flimsy was finished in early August but in between the numerous visits we made to the Grandparent’s House since then, this was the first time I had a decent block of time to tackle the quilting.  To tell you the truth, if you’ve seen Sandra’s Shine Quilt and admired the exquisite quilting she did on her quilt, you would understand my hesitancy in quilting straight lines which is the only type of machine quilting I do besides wavy lines and thinking that it would look too bland.  Surprisingly, I love how the straight lines looks and doesn’t the sunlight dappling through the tree branches onto the quilt make it “Shine”?
To give you a little back story on how the quilt got to be made, Sandra asked me a few months back if I would like to be a pattern tester for her Shine pattern which you may wonder why she would ask me since I”m a little rebel or tend to “misbehave” when I joined her QALs which have been, according to my calculations, five.  I’ve always did something a little different with either the background or construction and did not always follow her pattern but the finished quilt always looked the way Sandra designed it.  I promised Sandra that I would be a good pattern tester and would follow her instructions completely.  I chose to make my Shine quilt with Carrie Bloomston’s Wish fabric line with Ruby Star Society Spark fabric for the background.  I chose this for the background since I thought the Silver Gray fabric would help the letters and stars stand out and also I wanted a background fabric with a little detail to make up for the inevitable lackluster quilting.
This is the first time I had the opportunity to be a Pattern Tester and I took this task very seriously.  I read the cutting directions very carefully to make sure it was accurate.  I did order an extra half yard of the background just to make sure I had enough in case I made an error cutting or in this case my iron acted up and splashed rusty water while I was ironing it and ruined a quarter yard.  Thankfully I still had enough.
It didn’t take me to long to break my promise to make the quilt according to her instructions.  Sandra let me deviate from her Flying Geese method since I like to make them using my die-cutter and that was the only time I “misbehaved”. 
I wished I could had a video of me sitting by the sewing machine, concentrating on following the instruction with my finger running over each line to make sure the patches were sewn together correctly and then lifting my head up and staring into space when I realized then that I wasn’t a Pattern Tester but Sandra gave me a pattern test to see if I could really focus and follow her instructions. This happened when the patches were almost all sewn together into blocks. Talk about getting schooled for my “bad” QAL behavior.  At least the “test” was easy and also very fun to sew, I’m not saying this for extra credit.
I think I passed and learned some patience in sewing the top together.  I’m never one for pinning rows together but for this quilt I did to make sure they lined up.  Funny fact about the making of the top was I was really tempted to only finish the left half of the quilt since I thought that the Shine panel would make a nice banner especially for a classroom but my determination to be a good “Pattern Tester” prevailed. Also, I like to mentioned that this is the first time I ever pieced letters and really enjoyed making them.  I even told Sandra she has to come up with the rest of the alphabet.

Once the straight line quilting of 5/8” apart started, it was a breeze, no pinches or puckers.  It was really nice using Aurifil thread for both the piecing and quilting.  I really thought the straight lines would be boring but I think it gives the quilt a nice graphic look.
While I was machine quilting, I was listening to “The Gown: A Novel of the Royal Wedding” by Jennifer Robson which was recommended by Wendy of Pieceful Thoughts.  It’s a story about the embroiderers who worked on the wedding dress which inspired me to embroidered some of the stars around the flame with yellow floss. 

The backing was yardage of a gray dotted fabric I had in my stash which I love when that happens.  I originally wanted to bind the quilt with the same solid yellow fabric as the small stars but decided the gray and white geometric print would accent the colors of the quilt better; the yellow would have been overwhelming.
Shine was a Finally Finish this past weekend and of course rain was in the forecast so I didn’t think I would be able to post until later this week. Surprisingly the sun was shining on Labor Day and we had the opportunity to go to a friend’s house which has acreage to gather acorns for my squirrels.  I brought along Shine so I could take photos of it amongst the trees and, of course, with Honest John, the twelve-foot road sign on the property.  They look good together don’t they?

Here is the Link to the Shine Pattern which is available to purchase from Sandra’s Etsy Shop.  This is not an affiliate link and just wanted you to know where you can purchase this fun pattern. I still am tempted to make just the Shine panel which would make a nice door quilt or a banner for a future classroom.

It’ll be a few more days before we leave for the Grandparent House and my Shine Quilt will be living there now in the darling Granddaughter’s bedroom.  I’ve already made her another Patchwork Blankie which I will share on my next Post along with other projects done during the rest of September.  It seems like Summer is leaving us too soon. Hope everyone stays healthy and happy.

11 comments:

  1. Nice finish, Rose! I like the straight line quilting - it must've taken awhile, though! This will be a great quilt for the GP house! Glad you enjoyed The Gown, too.

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  2. Rose what a perfect finish! When I started reading I knew you would make some slight deviation from the pattern. The straight lines are perfect!

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  3. I LOVE piecing letters as well, and have collected several alphabets over the years. My most favourite is Lori Holt’s Spelling Bee book. It was definitely worth the cost, as I do use it often!

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  4. MMMarvelous! I love this and everything you did with it. For you, you were a pretty obedient tester!

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  5. Love that background fabric choice, Rose! That photo with Honest John is the best!!! Straight line quilting is the bomb! Looks great on your Shine quilt, Rose!

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  6. Lovely! And you are right that the picture with the bits of sunshine on the quilt is perfect! You are so funny, talking about Sandra testing you to see if you can follow a pattern all the way through :) And what a great job you did! I like the straight line quilting.

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  7. That is a wonderful version of Sandra's quilt! I love your color choices, and the straight line quilting looks great! That's about the only kind I do, too. I agree that a panel with the stars and the word Shine would be perfect to hang in a classroom!

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  8. The quilt turned out just gorgeous, Rose! With school just starting, this is the perfect timing for a post, where I 'tested' you and you passed with flying colours, when really it's the other way around and I passed the test of writing a pattern that made sense! I love the straight line quilting; definitely gives it a modern flair. What I love the most (other than smiling and chuckling all the way through this post) is the gold embroidery you did on the star around the candle flame! Such a beautiful touch and addition (extra credit!). I want to make this again, just as a banner and give it to a good friend of mine for her kindergarten classroom. She's very worried about going back and not being able to cuddle the little ones who always cry for the first week or two. Thank you for trying something new (being a tester/being tested)!

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    1. *embroidery you did on the stars around the flame...

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  9. Well, here I am way behind in blog reading. Yay for you sticking with the rules to pattern test. I haven’t bought many patterns, but I’m always surprised by the way the designers/pattern writers do things differently from the way I’m accustomed to. And then I feel just a bit guilty for changing them. This will be such a fun quilt for M! I liked your background fabric when I first looked at the photos on my teeny tiny phone screen, and then I realized those were stars, not polka dots! And then the embroidered stars. So cute! I hope M will have lots of shining moments under the quilt.

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I appreciate your comments but due to traveling and my ineptitude with typing on either my iPhone or iPad, my response may be somewhat delayed. Thank You for your understanding.