Centered

Here it is, finally finished. What should have been a quick and easy, down and dirty little quilt, turned out to be one big aggravation. First I tried doing French knots on the tips. After doing only a few, with thick embroidery floss, it was clear that I would be in a lot of pain by the time I finished. Scrap that idea.

Then I went and bought lots of beads and started sewing them on. After several hours of work and many beads later, I realized that I did not like it. Big beads obscured the design and small beads did not show. So I cut off all the beads and tried machine quilting, following the design in the flower centers. Didn't like that either. The pattern was very hard to follow and if I marked it with removable blue marker pen, it did not come out. By now the piece was so over worked that I totally scrapped it and made a new one.

I printed out four new photos and my printer was not happy doing that for some reason, but with perseverance and a few choice words, I got it done. I decided to quilt the center part in a straight grid 1/2 inch apart. It took a while, but I like it. I think the close straight lines add a nice tension to the curved lines in the photos. I'm calling it "Centered", a good play on words, I think.

Now I'm on to greater things, I hope. I'm going to make a second painted cabbage quilt, a companion piece for "Mon Petit Chou", seen here. I found a vegetable garden and took some new pictures yesterday. It is all drawn out on my fabric and I'm ready to paint tomorrow. I hope to finish this in a few days to meet a show deadline. Wish me luck!