Quilting the Challenge Quilt--One Monthly Goal Met and a FINISH!

One cornerstone sunshine quilted

Quilting texture and a curved design in the cornerstones were all the clues I had before I began the "fun" quilting on this piece. I picked three colors of Floriani 40 weight polyester gray threads from my stash. I looked at the quilt. I made some temperature blocks. I looked at the quilt. Honestly, I was stuck!

Gertie came to my rescue. She reminded me that I wanted to stitch a similar curved design in each cornerstone. I looked through my quilting rulers. I chalked some lines to get an idea how a design might look. I saw something that I liked so I quilted it.

I used a charcoal gray thread to quilt the design. I did use a ruler that I haven't had success in using in the past. I liked the thread and I liked the space that I could use later to quilt a little definition or shadow.

Ruler and stitched echos

Had I thought to place a piece of tape on the line of the ruler that I was using, I would have ripped less. In the end, I quilted all the spaces and I asked Gertie to be thinking about designs to place in some of the spaces. 

The reason I haven't had success with these rulers is that they have a post which often I end up banging into the back of the foot of my machine or I forget where the end of the ruler is until I find I can't move the project. Then I realize that I have one end of the ruler lodged against the side of the machine. 

Part of the inner border quilted

I bought the entire set of these Fine Line rulers based on another quilter saying they worked great for her. I wished I had tried them before buying!! Still I used three of them to quilt this project. Perhaps, there is hope that I will figure out how to use them after all! It is challenging to hold and position the longer rulers. The smaller rulers help me have better success at the quilting design.

Gertie, my inner squirrel, and I had a number of conferences regarding the best way to add texture to the borders. During one of our meetings, she mentioned she had heard that this was such a plain project. She asked if it was possible to ramp up the quilting so that it elevated the string piecing. I asked if I could figure out a design so that it too could add to the illusion of the project. Gertie liked my question and I liked her question. 

I thought about dividing the space so that if I were looking to the project from a height, each border would have a little different amount of the design showing. Then, I tried to quilt a line to divide the space. I couldn't hold the ruler. 

Design after the first border was quilted

I was in a car accident in 2009 where I was rear ended/shoved into the car in front of me; then rear ended/shoved into the car in front of me a second time. Over time, I've improved a lot; but, I have reduced feeling
in my fingers. I think I have a hold of something; but, I don't! I needed to figure out an alternate option to divide the space.

In the end, I used the blue wash away Clover marker, the ruler to mark the line. I quilted it with the walking foot and then I added three more lines of quilting to give more definition between the two areas. I did find that I needed to stitch with a white thread on the white fabric. 

The three borders and corner stone

Once I had defined the two areas; I free motion quilted some texture on the inside of the border. I followed up with quarter inch lines in the outer section of the border. I liked it. My plan then was to increase the free motion area in the other two borders while decreasing the straight line quilting area in the other two borders.

In the second border, I increased the curve depth which decreased the straight line quilting. I didn't follow a mathematical plan. If it looked good to my eye, I went with
it. (Gertie agreed!)

Auditioning more lines

It was challenging to mirror a similar curve to the first border; but, I feel I managed to get close. I did enjoy stretching my ability to combine motifs in the free motion areas. I'm still working to improve my ability to create an even area of dense and less dense quilting! I know that ability will come with more practice.

For the third border, I again decreased the straight line quilting. My thought was that if I were looking into the quilt, I would see more lines and less of the pattern. While I did enjoy the quilting process, it took, as my seven year old granddaughter would say, 

Cornerstone with additional lines

a L O N G time! 

Once I finished the border quilting, Gertie and I turned our attention to the corner stones. I tried a variation of a ribbon motif in the center of the shape; but, it didn't feel "right." I ended up adding texture similar to what I stitched in the borders. That quilting felt "right" and Gertie agreed with me. I was perplexed about how to treat the echo quilting around the shape. As it was, it felt like I hadn't finished. I quilted more lines and then it felt "right!" 

After, about fifty hours of quilting, I finished the quilting. I added the binding, label and sleeve. It measures 72 inches square. I had a FINISH! My friend, Martha, would have enjoyed seeing this finish. After all, I used her strings to make it!

Label

This was goal number one on my September list. It was my One Monthly Goal! It was also goal number one on my third quarter goal list. I'm linking to Patty at Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal - September Finish Link-up. I'm also linking to Cynthia at Oh Scrap/Quilting is More Fun Than Housework. 

I used 13 yards of fabric from my stash for this project. I created about four yards of fabric from my strings! But, I've purchased six yards of fabric so I have a net loss of 16 1/4 yards of fabric from my stash this year.

Finished quilt

Update 3/30/2022: I was inspired to make this project for the guild illusion challenge and also by the book "Your Grandmother Asked Me To Tell You She's Sorry" by Fredrik Backman that our book club decided to read in quarter one of 2022! I was inspired to make a project after reading the book in August 2021. What a nice surprise that this book was picked to be read!

You can read previous posts about this project. . 

Piecing the top

Stitching in the ditch

Regarding COVID:

Worldwide: 219M cases; 4.55M deaths

United States: 42.9M cases; 688K deaths

Oregon: 321K cases; 3,682 deaths

In spite of an increasing number of vaccinations, case numbers are still high. In Oregon, 66 percent have received one dose of the vaccine and 60 percent are fully vaccinated.  It is heartening to see the vaccination numbers increase each week. I wish the percentage were much higher. . .sigh.

A peak of the pieced back

A couple school districts in the state returned to online classes because of the high number of students out of class because of isolating from COVID exposure, testing positive for COVID or recovering from COVID. 

A classmate of my chiropractor's son, who is ten, tested positive for COVID. This knowledge caused him to be tested which turned out to be negative; but he still had to isolate and be retested last Friday. I hope he had a second negative result. 

The Northwest Quilting Expo show ended yesterday. I hear there were a lot of people attending and that all people were wearing masks properly. I didn't attend. I also hear it was a fabulous show. I am sorry that I didn't get to see it.