Yo, quilters... RESPECT!

If you can quilt - I bow down and kiss the carpet under your perfect little toes. You ROCK.

I'm about halfway through my very first quilt and it's driving me BANANAS.

Ok, so I may have gone about it in a bit of a slap happy way - my research on How To Make A Quilt consisted of 10 minutes reading one random online quilting article about strip piecing - but it's looking ok so far. A wee bit wonky but this is disguised somewhat by the darkish colour palette. And I must say, I'm happy with the fabrics. I've got a bit of Aleaxander Henry's Zen Charmer in there, some navy blue Asian prints and a rad batik border that kind of looks like seawater. The backing is white minky fleece which is super soft and hugable.

However, it's not how it looks that is bugging me. It's the technical bits. Let me just say, oh my goodness, I will NOT be making another quilt. And this is a simple design, just a 8 x 10 grid of 4 inch squares with a plain 4 inch border.

I have christened it my Half-Arsed Quilt. Intended for Holly and roughly cot sized, I have cut more corners than one would think possible: blocks nearly a centimetre out of alignment? Whatever. Sheet of polyester batting not quite big enough? Oh well. Minky backing tacked on with so many jumps and wrinkles in my stitching it looks pleated? Meh. 

The measuring. The preciseness. The cutting (of fingers - with a rotary cutter - not so good). The pressing. The not-being-able-to-finish-it-in-an-hour. Let's just say, it's not my bag baby.

I'm putting the layers together at the moment. I have, however, neglected to find out how to actually do this the proper way (well - the proper way that doesn't involve complicated time consuming basting and such), so my solution was to lay the top, batting and backing together as the finished product would look, use every pin in my pincushion to attach the slippery minky fleece to the other bits, and run a rough half inch raw seam around the edge. Tomorrow I will grab some navy satin blanket binding from Lincraft and stitch it over the top of my ugly edges. Voila!

Hang on... how do I actually quilt the thing? When do you do that bit? I guess I am doing it last.

What a dog's breakfast.

I will post a better photo when I have finished the sucker... but maybe, at low resolution and in crappy lighting it could almost pass for a 'real' quilt?