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Quilting a Quilt for Customers

I love quilting on my long-arm.  There are so many ways to attach a quilt to the long-arm.  I have done it several ways, but have gone back to the original way of pinning.  I can have it all loaded within 15 minutes.  It just seems too work the best for me.

This new quilt I have decided to add two layers of batting in it.  The quilt is for a child, she brought over poly-bat.  I told her what I learned in a class from a well know quilter last year.  That is that poly-bat will melt in a fire.  Which means a child caught under that blanket it will melt right on them.  She told us if a quilt is ever done for a child, you should never use poly-bat.  Therefore, I try to educate my customers then let them make that decision.  She decided to take the poly-bat back, but wanted it thicker than the single 80/20 that I currently have.  That is why I'm using 2 layers.

The backing wasn't wide enough so I had to add 4" muslin pieces to the sides.  It is very important to have 4" extra all the way around on your backing.  The quilt is loaded and ready to go.  I'm quilting it edge to edge, because she said not to do anything fancy.  It was just for and 8 year.  I have a splash pattern that looks like flowers and certain areas.  I got the pattern from Anne Bright.com.  I love her patterns.  It is finished.  She loved it.  It is fun doing quilts for customers.

Here is a picture of it on the frame.

 

 

The commissioned quilt

I was asked by my mother to make an over-sized California king quilt for her bed, back in October.  She had no pattern in mind and just asked that I use the color grey.  I stumbled for several days with the ideas of which line I could go with or just go scrappy or go batiks.  Then I decided to ask her for

a little more direction.  Did she have a picture or other furniture in the room that could help?  She sent me this picture.

 

After seeing this picture I decided to go with batik fabrics.  I love their shades and patterns.  Not to mention the all different colors that there are.  I picked 18 different batik colors.  A light turquoise and gray splatter for the center block.  Two different types of blues for the main parts of  the blocks.  And a solid gray Kona for the corners.  The borders are 2 different gray batiks.  Of course the a gray batik backing and leftover binding.

Shortly after that I became ill and unable to work on it for about 2 months.  I worked on it here and there, but with little progress.  I finally started cutting and sewing the first of December.  Then holidays came so little work was done.

Now it is the first of January and I have half the quilt blocks done.  I'm working on the second set of blocks now.  These blocks will also go around the outside of the quilt but cut in half and in between each of the circles.  I don't want to cut the blocks in half yet until I have all the rows individual sewn together to make sure I have everything right.  The biggest problem is making sure we don't get the same colors next to each other.

The pattern is called Playground, was designed by Denise Russart.  It was done in a lot smaller scale.  So I had a little figuring to do.

These are the circle blocks.

 

And these are square blocks that will go in between the circle.

 

 

UPDATE APRIL 4, 2014

I have been sewing non-stop since Monday March 30 getting this quilt and other projects together.  I am sewing the rows together right now.  We bought the backing and the batting.  I have the quilt design figured out.  So I need to finish sewing the rows, put the borders on, load, practice, quilt, and bind.  Then block, take pictures and enter it in the show.  To my relief I got an email today the extended the entry deadline one more week.  Thank you!   But I still need to push!