Niece's Quilt

I am not the fastest quilter and I doubt that I will ever finish a quilt top in a day. I do piece and I do quilt my quilts, so they take me a bit longer than if I sent them out to be quilted. I enjoy the process and love watching my creations come to life.

Here is my niece’s quilt top. I love making the Attic Window Blocks. I don’t mind the “Y” seams and find them fun. I do like the three dimensional illusion these quilts give the viewer. I had finished the top a while ago and just had not gotten around to the back until now.

I have started on the back and decided to make it a fantasy scene. This is the middle section, a castle. Not sure if it because it is near Halloween, but the castle looks like a spooky face with hands up.  (Notice the tub stained with water paints below the quilt. My niece likes to hang out in my sewing room, and she has been having a lot of fun water painting various boxes.)

I quilted this with big loopy quilts on the machine making it a quilt-as-you-go quilt. When I get the quilt put together with the top, Attic Window, then I will tie the top into the batting layers hopefully missing the back, the fantasy scene.

The bushes were made by sandwiching the purple fabric over batting and then adding a thin backing. Because of the extra batting in the bushes, they puff out just a little. Then I stitched them on like any other appliqué.

The blue in the sky is darker than what I thought it should be. The sky fabric was originally going to be the water section, but my niece liked it and wanted it to be the sky saying it looked stormy. So, being the loving auntie, I caved and did it the way she wanted. The grass seems too light compared to the sky, but that is what she wanted. So when I get around to finishing the back, the water will probably seem too light as well. Oh, what we do for the children in our lives.

I have had people ask why I don’t just put a simple backing on the quilt. I like the idea of reversible quilts and it has become my trade mark.