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Tuesday, October 9, 2018

Full Spectrum Medallion

Yesterday, I spent a lovely day with the Friendship Quilters Guild in Athens, AL, which also has some members in the North Alabama chapter of the Modern Quilt Guild.  We had such a fun time!  I have just a couple of open dates before my 2019 schedule is completely full.  Contact me ASAP to set something up for your guild!

Before I headed out of town though, I made sure to finish my latest medallion quilt  just so I could add it to my trunk show.  My, oh my!  Quilting this was quite an undertaking.


When I say that it was an undertaking, I mean that I spent 24 hours over the course of three days on the quilting.  This is undoubtedly the most detailed quilting I have ever done, and I absolutely love the result.


In the center, I quilted a free motion flower, and continued the petals into each part of the rainbow, including three petals in each part of the scalloped border.  In the negative space, I echoed the shape of the center and I like the way the straight(ish) lines play against the softer petal quilting.

In fact, throughout the entire quilt, I chose to quilt straight lines against curved designs to make sure that each part of the medallion really stood out (just an FYI- the entire quilt was quilted with free-motion, even the straight line designs).


On the Greek Cross blocks, I opted for a very small crosshatch quilting to follow the shape of the blocks.  With the curvy edges of the scalloped border against the straight edges of the Greek Crosses, at first I was unsure how to quilt the negative space between the two.  I should have realized that my very favorite free motion motif would be a perfect filler!  I opted to quilt tiny, micro-stippling there.  Just for reference, the spacing between the stippling lines is only 1/8-1/4".

Even though I like the end result, the Square In Square blocks were my least favorite part of the process.  Those square spirals took FOREVER, and I will say this- it's a good thing I'm okay with "organic" quilting lines.


In the border surrounding the Square In Square blocks, I quilted figure-eight loops.  This is actually the first time I've quilted this motif on such a large space, and I was pleasantly surprised at how easily it went.  Rather than having the loops span the entire width of the border, I added an echoing line on the top and bottom to give the design a little more definition.  Since I wasn't sure how to carry the loops around the corners, I decided to quilt petals there.


The triangle border got quilted with tight swirls, and I added pebble quilting to the corner stars.  I have quilted pebbles in very small spaces before, but never this much, and I'm pretty happy with them.  Echoing lines give great definition to the outer edge of the quilt.


A rainbow of Aurifil 50 wt. thread complimented each color section perfectly (along with white, of course).  Instead of using a consistent thread on the back, I always like to keep my top and bobbin threads the same, so there is a lovely rainbow on the back of the quilt as well!


I pulled fat quarter pieces straight from my stash for the back.  I arranged the fabrics as close to a spiral rainbow as possible, which proved to be somewhat difficult with such large pieces.  I still enjoy the warm/cool effect created though.


There was really only one choice for binding this quilt- a rainbow!  Color-matched to each section, of course.  Since I bind all of my quilts by machine, sewing them to the back of the quilt first, I had to really do some planning to make this happen.  The rainbow of thread on the back of the quilt really helped keep me on track though!

I am in love with the way this quilt turned out, and even more than that, I am really proud of it!   This quilt finishes at 72" square.  I am still working out the details, but I am considering writing the pattern and offering this as a Block of the Month QAL in 2019.  I'm still thinking though the details, but I'll be sure to keep you posted!


24 comments:

  1. What a beautiful finish and how fun that you got to share it with a guild right away. :)

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  2. So so so lovely! Love the scrappy look and love the beautiful quilting!

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  3. Kelly, that is a gorgeous quilt! Definitely an accomplishment - both the piecing and the quilting!

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  4. That's awesome; thanks for the breakdown of your FMQ designs...I have a couple of quilt-tops that I am trying to decide how to quilt and you've given me some ideas (I love the figure 8s!)

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  5. A lovely rainbow quilt! I like all your different quilting bits too, especially the organic quilting lines in the squareinasquare blocks. And what a clever way to do the binding, very effective!

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  6. This is lovely ! Thank you for sharing thé 'organic' quilting which shows individual 'imperfections' Can lead to a great general effect

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  7. I love this quilt! I have Stash Statement and can't figure out why it seems intimidating to me. A BOM or QAL would be fun for the piecing and quilting.

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  8. So beautiful! Fmq really makes it shine!

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  9. Totally gorgeous Kelly. So bright and that quilting is intricate and beautiful. The backing is awesome as well.

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  10. The quilting is grand….. great quilt.

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  11. Your quilting is amazing. It's so inspiring!

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  12. What a great finish Kelly! The quilting variety is simply amazing.

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  13. This is GORGEOUS, Kelly! Truly a masterpiece, and I just love the quilting. Remind me, are you quilting on a domestic machine or with a longarm? I'm curious because I'm about to quilt an outreach baby quilt and I'm thinking of trying cotton thread on my longarm for the first time. Wondering whether the 50/2 Aurifil like what you used is strong enough to handle the "rough love" of longarm quilting... :-) Congratulations on a truly spectacular finish!!

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  14. All I can say is WOW and am exhausted reading the details of the machine quilting and in awe that you do it on a domestic. I can't imagine what you would do if you had a longarm. I love the idea of making crumb blocks and a BOM would be a perfect way to finally doing them. With my granddaughter's visit this week, I finished this month's CMM blocks and already pulled my fabrics for next month's snowball blocks and was tempted to make them using the crumb method but decided not to; BOM would be better. I already know there is no way I could ever duplicate your wonderful quilting on your medallion quilt. Hope you have a great trunk show!

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  15. Lovely colorful quilt!!!

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  16. Lovely. I really, really like it.

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  17. Oh, it's just gorgeous! Everything about it is beautiful, and the quilting is so intricate. This quilt is spectacular, please write a pattern for it.

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  18. Love this quilt! It would be a perfect way to use up some of my scraps! I hope you do/post the pattern!

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Thanks so much for your comment and for visiting! I read and appreciate every single comment, and I reply to each one as soon as I can. If you don't hear back from me, you might be a no-reply blogger. :)

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