Wedding Quilt

Pattern
I used the Tossed Nine Patch by Eleanor Burns  On this link there is a video about how this is done.  Eeesy-peesy!!


Fabrics
Once I decided on the nine patch, I picked nine fabrics. The wedding was in October so I obviously went with fall colors.  Before I left for fabric shopping hubby said that I just had to get a wheat pattern.  I agreed, wheat just screams fall on the prairies!   I was thrilled when I found a really pretty one (the darker one in the middle) and I also found the one that looked like another grain crop, barley maybe? 

Then I found the house fabric and thought it was perfect for wedding quilt because it represents a new beginning in marriage for them.  The other colors in the house fabric are red & green so I started to look for coordinating fabrics and found the two green fabrics.  As I was looking I found the 4th gold fabric that has small bits of red in it that are kind of shaped like tiny hearts - perfect!

Then I spotted the black fabric with the gold colored ropes and it immediately reminded me of my brother.  Nearby was the brown and red rope fabrics!!  And ta-da I had 9 fabrics!

 

Cutting
Then I had to cut squares.  In order to make a queen sized quilt I needed at 42 nine patches.  The way the cutting worked out I ended up with 432 squares.  Whew, that was alot of cutting!

Carlee was my little helper!  She said to me "WOW Mama! That is alot of squares, can we finally start sewing now!!"

Piecing
First I sewed the squares into a nine-patch block.  Then I cut it up the middle and across the middle which made 4 squares.  Two of these squares were flipped or "tossed" and then I sewed the 4 squares back together into the final block. Make sense?  In the two pictures below look at the red fabric to see how they moved.  Now that I look at it though, the top corners - the house and the barley ended up swapped around when I made the original nine patches.  Now that you are completely confused....

Here are the first few blocks.

Borders, Back, Pinning
I didn't get any photos of the borders being put on, or the backing being put together.  I was really running out of time.  When I pinned it I only had a week left before we flew to Canada and I wanted to quilt it and bind it before we left!!  The pinning was quite a chore in itself.  There was not enough floor space in the house so I took it to the church.  Before I took it up off the floor I walked all over it and if I didn't step on a pin I added another one.  The more pins, the better chance of no puckers on the back when it is quilted. I used about 600 pins to pin the backing and the batting to the top.

Here is what it looked like on the floor of the church.

Quilting
Then began the very long quilting process!  It was quite difficult to maneuver all that fabric!  I have decided that I will not soon do another queen size quilt!!!  This photo was taken with my cell phone.  My friend had texted me to see if I was done yet so I sent her this photo back.   I am glad I did because it is the only photo of the quilting process.  I moved the sewing machine to the kitchen table to have the extra length to support the fabric.  Then I rolled the ends and straight-line stitched every seam.  Some of the seams were offset so I used a ruler and a chalk pencil to make a line to follow.  But even with all those lines, I still can't sew a straight line!!! 

I finished the quilting and then the binding.  I finished at about 2am the morning before our flight!  Now that was cutting it close! 

Here is a peek at the completed back.  I used red thread and it really turned out nicely on both the front and the back.

And the finished product. I was really pleased with the results and the best compliment was when I gave it to my new sister-in-law she said "Oh Wow! No one has ever made me a quilt before! Thank you!!"