Red Stars Quilt

Shining in the sunlight

This quilt was started more than 5 years ago. All of these fabrics are from mom's stash. I started with a few small stars and then headed back to mom's to pick out as many complementary reds, whites, and off-whites as I could find. If I had a plan at the time, for what this quilt would look like, I do not remember it at all. Judging from some of these pictures, most of the piecing was done on my Pfaff 131. 

Making stars without an end goal in mind

Making a large star

Large star filled with other stars and squares

Filling in the large star

Large star is finished

Background of darker squares

Hanging in the dining room

While it was waiting for the next step the pieced top spent time hanging in the dining room, hanging in my classroom for the 2018-19 school year, and sitting folded in a pile. Finally, while we were self-distancing in March of 2020, I got around to making a backing for the quilt. This was a fun backing to make as I had to use only the fabrics that were in the house. Originally, I wanted to use only reds and browns but I had to branch out a bit when I realized I didn't have enough scraps in that range.

Back was pieced over spring break

Looked like it was going to fit

This quilt was basted in April while we were social distancing. Normally, I would have taken the quilt over to mom's so that I could work on carpeted floors, but I had to get creative at my house this time. I ended up taping the backing to my floors with blue painters tape and then sliding my rotary cutting mats around under the layers so that I didn't damage my wood floors with safety pins.

Backing taped to the floor

Layer of batting

Stewie admiring a job well done

Once the quilt was basted, I started hand quilting the star in the middle with concentric circles. I used my PVC lap frame and worked when I was watching movies or during Loose Ends. It took a couple months to finish the circles at that rate.

Finished circles viewed from the back

Finished circles

When the circles were done I decided that I wanted to machine quilt the background. For that I used my Bernina 717. It took the remains of 4 different spools of brown and tan thread, but I don't think you'll be able to see where the thread color changed.

4 empty spools

The seam guide on the walking foot saved me from having to mark every line with chalk

Hand and machine quilting finished

When it came time to do the binding, I had very few fabric pieces of any size left. Most of the extras had gone into the backing. I pulled out any and all scraps I could find and it ended up making a strip that has a seam about every 6-10 inches. I sewed the binding on by machine and then finished tacking it down by hand.

Piecing scraps for the binding

Working on the porch late one evening

Binding done, ready for the wash

All those concentric circles

The patchwork backing is almost as interesting as the front of the quilt

The clothes line needs to be a bit higher up

The last thing to do was sew a sleeve on the back so that I could hang it on a dowel rod. I finished attaching that by hand and then hung the quilt in the dining room.