Anyways… a long long time ago in a state far far away….I should have been packing all my worldly possessions to move from Miami back to my hometown in NY. Instead, I was still taking classes at my LQS since I loved my friends and teachers there and feared the quilting here in NY would be different. That’s why this months UFO was never finished although it was sew close. And do you know what the biggest obstacle was to finish it?? Math!
Rusty, AKA Jane Hardy Miller, was a teacher at our store and the person who forced me to learn "color." She had already published the very popular French Braid Quilts and was working on her second book: French Braid Obsession. We were testing a pattern for the book and had we finished our quilts we might have had the opportunity to have it included in the book. Guess mine won't be in the book, huh?!
WWHHAATT?? – in looking up links for Rusty’s book, I see she has a new one coming out in June this year. Better start saving my pennies!
When I pulled this UFO out of it's drawer I found I had all four braids done with their purple spacer strip attached and some notes on the math to get the panel to fit into the center. I would have done things a little different now, such as cutting the panel slightly narrower and the extra spacers I still need to add bigger, so I could save the selvage dots for my collection and I would have purchased more of that great stripe for the binding. Oh well, hindsight is 20/20 and when you stall you can’t make changes. Either way, I have checked the math three more times and it still appears to come out ok so I finally cut the panel this morning and tonight or tomorrow (before season 2 arrives) I can get the spacer strips attached.
I didn’t lay out the extra spacers in this picture but that same purple will be used to add a 1.5” finished border around the center panel. Then I add the braids, trim the edges and it’s done. What will that take? A couple hours? And then another drawer is emptied!
I have always referred to this quilt as my wine french braid because of the grape/leaf fabrics and the colors. Maybe I should get some of that wine cork fabric for the back. It would really complement the top. Not that I have the money or time to actually finish the whole thing super soon.
Mainly because I did buy this flannel backing for the t-shirt quilt finished last month for the UFO Challenge. Think 9 patch: there will be 40” squares of the green in the 4 corners, the inner side rectangles will be about 12” of the teal and the center 12x12 square will be the green again. I thought it would be the best use of yardage and would make it as interesting as the front.
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