Believe Circle Quilt Finish

This Independence Day long weekend gave me some much needed sewing time.

The idea for this quilt started back in May when it was my turn to be the quilter for the do. Good Stitches Believe Circle. Here's where I first wrote about it. Eight other stitchers contributed two blocks each to this quilt. The block comes from Sew, Mama, Sew BOM2. Those were some good mail days as the blocks began to arrive.

Originally, I thought I would use white or cream thread for the entire quilt, but one of the stitchers sent a special surprise with their blocks.

And it was filled with these beauties:

Once the blocks were arranged, I decided that sticking with white or cream thread for all of the quilting was going to make it too pretty. I didn't want "pretty", I wanted "fun". These brightly colored Aurifil 50 weight threads were just the touch of "fun" this quilt needed.

I did stick with Aurifil 50 weight cream thread to anchor the quilt with three lines of quilting going diagonally through the colored blocks. Each one of the spirals that occupies the white space is stitched in a different color of thread.

To finish it off, it is bound with a black and bright geometric print.

To keep it symmetrical, there are sixteen blocks on the front in a four by four design. The two extra blocks make a great statement on the back so that this quilt can be enjoyed from either side.

Each of the spirals is free motion quilted, which showed me that I need many more hour of practice before my hand will be steady enough for a larger design. I used a blue water soluble pen to draw the spiral before quilting. I can freehand fairly well in small area, but these spirals are about fifteen inches wide. Those drawn lines helped keep the design relatively consistent.

The binding was machine stitched to the front and hand stitched to the back. I know a lot of quilters love the speed of a binding sewn completely by machine. However, I'm a sucker for the slow finish. The binding is the last hurrah of being able to handle a quilt while it's still in progress. I relish that time to quietly hand sew the binding. After I finished this one though, I started thinking about sending it out into the world, and that it had the potential to be handled roughly. So I went back and machine stitched in the ditch from the front to catch the back binding and secure it much better than any hand stitching ever could. It' now ready to be wadded and drug and sat on and snuggled and whatever its future owner deems worthy.

This quilt is being sent to My Very Own Blanket who will put it in the hands of a foster child in need.

This was such a fun quilt to make. I can't think of a better way to spend those few extra hours this holiday weekend gave me.