Can You See My Grin?

It's grey and rainy, and a wee bit windy outside, but do I care? Hell no!

Over three years collecting - buying, trading, being generously given - all the Heather Ross fabrics I could get me greedy little paws on.

Over two years talking about making a quilt that featured Heather Ross fabrics and nothing but Heather Ross fabrics. Turning ideas over in my mind. Knowing that the pattern would have to be 100% original to me. No one else would have a quilt quite like mine. (I'm selfish like that.)

Then the best part of a year in the making. Surviving the hiatus from sewing in the summertime. Surviving me discovering that pebble quilting is a bugger to do, and uses thread like there is no tomorrow.

And then suddenly, I was done.

Granted the weather is not condusive to a good photo shoot. There was no way in hell that this quilt was touching any wet surface out there. But I couldn't wait to show you, despite being limited to the hanging from the trampoline photos. Let the wind blow, I am a patient woman at times.

Other than the two Kona solids, the entire quilt is made up of Heather Ross fabrics. Conveniently she came out with Briar Rose in time for me to purchase some for the backing and binding. The varied quilting gives all sorts of texture to the back.

The entire quilt was pieced and quilted with Aurifil 50w 2600, the very palest of greys. You don't notice that it is grey at all, unless you look at the pebbling, especially where the pebbling appears on the white piecing on the back. I rather like the accentuation you get from this.

I quilted in the ditch around every last piece of Heather Ross in each rectangle. There was a lot of quilt turning involved but I was determined that nothing would detract from the feature fabrics. Then I did straightline quilting round each mosaic in the white sashing to frame them. I followed this up with pebble fmq quilting for my first ever time in all the blue space.

The quilting is far from perfect but I don't care. This quilt is for me. Me, me, me. Not the girls. Not for guests. It's for me. I don't want to leave any room for doubt, okay.

Here are some basic facts about it -

Pattern - my own, made up as I went along.
Fabrics - Heather Ross and Kona solids.
Thread - Aurifil 50w 2600
Size - 49" x 60"

And for all the cutting up of my precious Heather Ross stash, the good news is that I still have a fair amount left. But now that I have made this quilt maybe I won't be afraid to use it in other projects.

How can these fabrics not make you smile?

Susan