Social Climber - Faith Circle Style

I just finished reading a post by Debbie at A Quilter's Table about how quickly a quilt can be made from start to final binding stitch. It seems that 7 hours is a real possibility for a baby quilt. Contrast that with my decidedly un-quick work on the Social Climber quilt. The Faith Circle ladies stitched up the blocks last October and mailed them off to me. At that same time I was spending every free moment working on the Snowflake Among the Stars wedding quilt for a dear couple. It had to be ready for a December wedding date. Then, of course, came Christmas and New Years - not a good time for finishing large quilt projects. As soon as the holiday season was over I knew I'd need to dedicate all my time to completing Mixed Flock in time for the Northern Shenandoah Valley Quilt Show in April. Fast forward to the end of the school year and another wedding gift (soon to be revealed) and Social Climber was just not getting the attention it so deserved.

Well, I'm so pleased to be able to say Social Climber is now complete!

Social Climber - pattern by Villa Rosa Designs

With a burst of dedicated effort I was able to finish the quilting, binding, washing, and photographing in a two day period. How's that for getting a second wind on this project?

My inspiration for the quilting came from a Craftsy class I bought, Creative Quilting with Your Walking Foot, taught by Jacquie Gering. One of the lessons teaches how to do sectioned curves. Needing something a little more at my comfort level I divided quilt into three sections and did straight line quilting instead of curves. I used masking tape to space the lines at 1" intervals - just moving the tape with each line of quilting.

Pieced back for Social Climber

For the back I used one large piece of My Sunshine, a Riley Blake Designs fabric and then finished out with several smaller cuts from my stash. This photo of the quilt back also shows the quilting better. I was looking through my stash trying to find enough fabric to do the binding, however there just was nothing that would work. As I trimmed down the quilt top I noted that there was significant backing fabric on all sides being cut away. It turned out I had enough fabric to cut down into binding strips - Hooray! No extra scraps created!

All in all this turned out to be a lovely quilt and I'm so happy to have it finished!

In the interest of ensuring a sturdy binding I machine stitched it - folding to the front so I could make sure it had the best results possible. I went ahead and used straight stitching and although not perfect, it's not bad! My sewing skills have greatly improved since my last attempt to attach a binding using this method.

The Faith Circle donates it's quilts to Restore Innocence. A Colorado based non-profit which aids in the restoration of young women rescued from human trafficking. You can read more about them here. Thank you Faith Circle ladies for your work on these blocks - you're a great group of ladies to sew with :o)

The Gauntlet Has Been Thrown Down

About a month ago I posted this picture on Instagram of blocks hanging on my design wall. These blocks belong to a quilt project named The Random Sampler. It was a quilt-along begun by my friend Anita from Bloomin' Workshop. Several of us started these blocks back in 2012 and to my knowledge only Lotje ended up with a finished quilt.

Random Sampler quilt blocks

Anita suggested we all pull our blocks back out in March and cheer each other on to a finish - effectively throwing out the challenge to the rest of us slackers :o) Now I have to admit, I love working on blocks for this quilt because I can toss in anything and everything I feel like making. And, this is a quilt I am making for myself so there is no right or wrong. Funny - We don't have any quilts I've made, except for a few small wall hangings, so this will be the first large-ish quilt I'd finish for our home. There are two other unfinished quilts that are also supposed to be for us. Seems the only quilts I manage to finish are those intended for others.

As much as I'd love to dive in and work on my Random Sampler I've got two projects I should finish first. I've been so good at working my way through the To Do list I wrote up some time last summer and I'm down to just the two quilts. Here they are:

Social Climber is another Faith Circle quilt destined to be sent to Restore Innocence. This quilt is pin basted and ready for quilting. As of yet I have not decided how to quilt it...any suggestions are most welcome! Feel free to leave them in the comments. 

Social Climber ~ A Faith Circle Quilt

Then, I'm on a tight schedule to finish up my Mixed Flock quilt for a local show coming up in mid-April. I don't think I've introduced the Mixed Flock top on the blog...this is my original design using the Dashing Geese block I created for QuiltMakers 100 Blocks magazine, Volume 9. However, Mixed Flock puts a completely different spin on the block by mixing up the color placement. 

Mixed Flock - progress shot

I'm hoping you can see four large, bright "interpretive" stars, and one gray star, too. In a way I think Mixed Flock has a bit of a Southwestern look to it. I'm in the process of piecing the outer borders to finish the quilt top. Here's a sketch to show where I'm heading with the final design:

Mixed Flock - the plan

So, the question is, "Will I be picking up the Random Sampler gauntlet?" Many times what I should do, and what I end up doing, are two different things...we'll see how the month of March plays out :o) 

What would you do?