Brick (Quilt #4) Bound & Beautiful

Once again a rush of euphoria. I think finishing a quilt is my new drug of choice. ;)

This quilt gave me a run for my money, but I powered through and am really please with how it turned out. The blue background doesn't quite go with the front but I purchased it back when I had a slightly different quilt design in mind and once I changed the quilt design I didn't think it mattered that much that I needed to buy more fabric. It's how it feels that matters more and since its snuggle flannel if feels lovely.

Quilting

While I would have loved to have quilted each of the quilts myself there was no way on God's green earth that I was going to have the time to quilt each one before Christmas. So I took them to Judy at A Better Quilt and within 3 days she had all 4 quilts complete. They are BEAUTIFUL.

Quilt #1 Front

Quilt #1Back

I used quilting flannel for the backs because I want them to be all soft an snuggly. Right now they are still a little stiff but once I add the binding and give them a wash I think they'll soften up wonderfully.

Quilt#2 Front

 I am THRILLED with how the quilting came out for Quilt #2, definitely my favorite out of the four.

Quilt#2

Since the pattern of the fabric for Quilt #3 was so busy we just did a simple meander pattern.

Quilt #3

 It took me forever to pick the quilt pattern for Quilt #4 but we eventually got it and its lovely.

Quilt#4 Front

Quilt#4 Back

Now all I have to do is add the borders and possibly a label and they will be complete!

Quilt-top #4 complete

Whew, I'm very happy to say that Quilt-top #4 is complete.

This one was probably the most challenging to finish because of the wonkiness at the bottom.

It's definitely not perfect but looks fairly decent with the borders added. I wished it photographed better, it looks a little washed out. The fabrics are lovely and I think it looks pretty good in person.

I'm sure there was a better way

I'm pretty sure I pieced Quilt # 4 together in the most time consuming and ill-conceived way possible.

I didn't follow a pattern (I could have), I just planned it out all in my head and a little on paper and figured it'd all work out. That is SO not the way to make a quilt when the total number of quilts you've ever made can be counted on one hand. I'm still a newbie/beginner/novice when it comes to quilting so you'd think I'd use more sense and follow a pattern. Naw, not me, I figure if I can draw it on a piece of paper I can make it with out any issues. Ugh, every pitfall I inevitably fall into is a hole I dug myself.

I was tempted to stop at a certain point so that I could just add the borders and be done but I asked my husband for his opinion, should the bricks be all lined up or off set.

He suggested offset and I agreed.

So all 9 columns are complete, each column has 7 1/2 'bricks'. That's when things started to go downhill.
Each column I would sew on was shorter than the column before it. How in the world can I start off with the exact same dimensions on every piece of fabric and end up with 9 columns each one successively shorter than the one before? HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN!?!?! It would make total sense to me if I had one long, one short, one long, one short, or some sort of variance but COME ON, every one shorter than the one before it?! Sheesh.

And here it is almost finished:

Now I have to figure out how to square it up a bit before adding the borders