Projects with no particular deadline in mind seem to languish on and on around here. I whipped up the Little Hexie Quilt in practically no time compared to this quilt (4 months). But it had a due date. While I will concede that it's much smaller, and should take less time, the design of that quilt was much more complicated. But, taking nearly 3 years to complete a quilt is certainly the longest time I've spent on one.
I made this one for hubby to use on the bed. As I've mentioned before, he's a terrible blanket thief so we don't share blankets, otherwise all my blankets end up no longer on me. He had been using a store-bought quilt I've had for ages, but it's been getting a little ratty. I finished this one just in time.
The pattern itself was fairly simple- just making 6" wide strip sets of three homespun fabrics and then cutting the strips sets into 6" squares. Then I stitched them together, alternating their placement vertically or horizontally. Not complicated, but time consuming. I had the strip sets sew up for a long time before I got around to cutting the squares.
I added a border to it with this nice green plaid that has nice stars on it. That wasn't in the original plans, but I really liked it when I went to pick out the backing fabric. This project, though, since it took a long time, does suffer a little bit in places. My skills in cutting and piecing have increased since I started it, and it was a little frustrating trying to work around mistakes I had made.
I did a simple stitch-in-the-ditch to quilt it all together. Nothing fancy, since I wanted it to keep the rustic feel of the homsepuns. I really like how they came together, I'd like to work on another project with them sometime in the future.
Of course, as soon as I set out the quilt, my "helper" had to test it. This quilt, like all other quilts, blankets, fabric, fabric scraps, and clothes left on the floor, is Piper tested and Piper approved for comfort. I eventually had to lock her out of the room to get a decent picture of the quilt on the bed without interference.
I'm glad this one is finally finished. Perhaps now I'll learn not to let projects hang over my head for ages and ages... but probably not.
