Lime-Teal Quilt Part 2: A Walking Foot and A Finished Quilt

Shining in the sun 

Mom and I were still in Golconda, IL when this quilt top was finished and ready to be quilted. On a day trip to Paducah, KY, I picked up some batting and backing from Hancock's of Paducah. The backing was a batik that I picked up from the remnant table. Due to some poor math on my part I thought I had plenty of fabric for the backing, but it turns out I was a bit short and ended up piecing some extra polka-dot fabric onto the backing as well. Not a problem, this quilt is all about using fabric scraps and piecing things together as needed.

Layers ready to be basted

Quilt is basted

In choosing a pattern for the quilting, I was looking for something that could be done by machine and would not compete with the blocks. This is a lot going on visually with the fabric and variety of blocks designs in this quilt and I wanted quilting that would add some texture but wouldn't demand attention. There are also quite a few seams on this quilt and some very small pieces in the blocks, so I didn't want to add heavy quilting. Mom suggested fans and we set about making a template. There was no paper at the house and we had no pencil or pen, so mom used some leftover fabric from the backing and her chalk marking tool to draw out the fan template.

Mom sketching out a fan stencil

This will be the largest fan and then I will add fans with 1" spacing inside it

Along with a visit to Hancock's of Paducah, mom and I visited the National Quilt Museum and another quilt/fabric shop. It was at that shop that I purchased a walking foot for my Bernina 730 Record. We had a bit of trouble finding one that would work with the old style prongs of the 730 feet, but eventually they found one in the back room.  We tried it out on a Bernina 830 Record that they had in the shop and it worked so we were confident it would fit the 730 as well. I had never sewn with a walking foot before, this was my first project with it.

Bernina walking foot and accessories

When I got home from Golconda, I set up my machine with the walking foot on the dining room table. This gave me plenty of table space to layout the quilt.

Using cats as fabric weights slows quilting progress

I need constant supervision

New to me walking foot

The walking foot worked well, and I improved in my skills of changing direction in my sewing and keeping keeping the material flowing through the machine at a constant rate. It was easy to forget about the fabric bunching up under the sewing machine arm and then movement along the curved fans was impeded. If anyone looks closely at the stitches they will know that it was done by a beginner, but again, the focus for this quilt is on the variety of blocks and not the quilting. I learned a lot using the walking foot this time, and I know that I will continue to improve with the next project.

When it came to adding the binding, I was worried that I didn't have enough of the solid teal. I entertained the idea of piecing the binding from quilt scraps, but I really wanted to try to have a uniform binding so I cut what was left of my teal fabric into strips and crossed my fingers.  The binding strips were sewn together and then added to the quilt using my Bernina 717. This machine sits in its own table and while the workspace is smaller, it's difficult for a cat to share the space.

Sewing on the binding

Once the binding was on though, I moved back to the dining room table so that I could finish sewing by hand. Again, I had my handy fabric weights.

Here's a peek at the batik backing

The last steps were to sign the back of the quilt and to add a sleeve so that the quilt could hang on the wall. The finished size is 54" square. I probably feel this way every time I finish a quilt, but this one is my current favorite. I love that my mom and sisters and I all contributed to the design and construction of this one-of-a kind artwork.    

Hanging on wall

Hanging on fence