The holiday weekend has proven to be sew wonderful!   While my children (and husband) chose to swim at the city pool, I stayed home to quilt.  It was only 70 degrees, for goodness sake.  They are doing good to get me in the pool when it is 90 degrees!

I managed to finish quilting my Mother’s new “Farmer’s Market” quilt that she did as a BOM, in 2015, with Prairie Point Quilt and Fabric Shop.   I think that the top may be made with Kansas Troubles, Sunflower Song Fabrics.  I have to say,I LOVE IT.  I really love how the blue in this line, used in the borders, helped set off the blocks.  The backing was a cotton sateen.  I have never used this as a backing before.  It has a shiny finish.

I was nervous to quilt the shiny cotton.  When I was selecting thread, nothing seemed quite right.  I was playing around, and found one of my Floriani embroidery threads that matched perfectly.  Believe it or not, it was called “Harvest”.  Right now, my favorite thread supplier is Red Rock Threads. I wasn’t too worried about using a polyester, as I used a Poly Cotton batting. The Floriani also had more sheen than my other quilting threads, so I decided to take the plunge.  I am so glad that I did.  I quilted it using an E2E pattern by Nancy Haacke, Wasatch Quilting called “New Beginnings”.   I love her description of how she selected the name.  She said she chose it as a symbol that change is inevitable in our lives.

I loved the pattern because it meshes classic feathers with some wild whimsy.  Peaking through the feathers is a flounce of pearls and wild grasses or cat tails!  I used to love picking and running my fingers over the fuzzy cat tails that would sneak out before mowing, or around rocks and railroad ties that didn’t quite get “weed wacked”.  After all, I was pretty terrible at mowing my parents yard.  I’m so grateful my husband does all of that at our home now!

I hope my Mother loves her quilt.  This one didn’t get custom quilting, but the design, which took an hour per pass, really looks great with her extraordinary piecing!  She pays such close attention to detail.  I’m glad she made this one for her home.  The picture here won’t do it justice.  Maybe, once it is bound, we can get a better photograph.  It was raining and wet all weekend, so I had to take a picture inside with my extra special quilt holders in the background!

It looks like the rain will give us a day off, so I imagine we will be playing today.  I have a few more blocks to show you, but might post those later this week.

PEACE and HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY! 

Note:  The cotton sateen is more difficult to “Frog” if you find you have any stitches that need corrected.  Be extra careful not to snag it and ruin the pretty sheen.  

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