Pastel Squares Quilt

My Valentine Quilt

This quilt was started in August of 2019 and the inspiration for these quilt blocks came from a Moda pattern I saw online.  It was called Thicket and featured a line of their fabric that had larger animals on it. I liked the idea of the random background blocks and decided to fill in the animal spaces with more square blocks.

Inspiration photo online

The top was pieced on the front porch when it was warm and sunny outside. I set up my Bernina 830 on top of a treadle stand and then I was able to sew standing up. The ironing board was off to my left and the quilt was spread out on the floor behind me. I had a great view out the front windows and good light for the whole afternoon.

Standing work station

I had plenty of help with the layout

While moving back and forth between the machine and the quilt on the floor I'm sure I got in over a hundred squats for the day. 

Checking replacement blocks to see that overall pattern stays random

The finished top did not get basted and quilted until February of 2020. I finally pieced a backing from scraps of fabric I had and then took the layers over to mom's house to baste.

Backing , pre-baste

I knew I wanted to hand quilt, but was very aware of the large number of seams in each block. To minimize how many seams I'd have to cross, I alternated X's and 0's across the blocks and then put a heart in the center of each square. The hearts and circle templates were cut out of cardboard from a frozen pizza box. 

Circle traced from a jar and two free-handed hearts

Slow going on the quilting

Again, impeded progress

Sometimes the quilting stands out and sometimes the fabric is noticed first

Once the quilting was finished I looked through my stash for a suitable binding. I was completely out of any of the fabrics that were in the quilt, so I tried out the only solid I had. The gray did compliment the darker grays in the quilt, but it was a bit dark for the binding so I went to Vogue for another option.

A bit dark and not enough for all the binding anyway

There was only one fabric at Vogue that was even close to what I had pictured. A light gray background with a non-floral pattern, lucky find. The binding was sewn on using my Bernina 1120 and then finished by hand.

Bernina 1120 with walking foot

After sewing on the binding, I noticed that there was one place where it was not attached to the front of the quilt.  I went back and added some zig-zag stitching. It's not invisible, but I bet no one notices besides me.

A bit of mending

I had to wash the finished quilt two times to get the pencil markings out and then hung it dry over the shower curtain rod. This one will need a sleeve on the back since it will hang on the wall, but for now I just clipped it onto the hanging rod. 

This color combo really has grown on me

Hearts in every block