According to the news and weather forecasts, we are expecting a foot or more of snow to fall today. Thank goodness I don't have to go out anywhere so I don't even need to conjure up an excuse to spend the better part of the day in my sewing room. I'm still working on piecing together my BOM. Because it's a sampler and each block is a different size, I'm finding that the process is not as easy as I thought it would be. Patience, I know.
Just before Christmas, I received a call from my friend Barb who is a professional longarm quilter to say that my quilt was ready. Barb had my quilt since May and I told her when I dropped it off that I wasn't in a hurry and to do it when she could fit it into her schedule.
When I saw the project in the June 2008 issue of American Patchwork & Quilting magazine, I fell in love with the design. (Remember, magazines come out a couple of months before the actual issue month just in case some of you are wondering how she could have had my quilt in May when this was in the June issue.
I knew it was going to be a challenge for me but I was determined. It took me 10 days to cut and piece the quilt and I did make some changes along the way to the original design. Here is the final result...
The pattern is called "Sweet Retreat" and was designed by Holly Holderman of Lakehouse Dry Goods. In her design, Holly had included some large floral setting squares which I opted to leave out. I don't know whether the next photo will show the wonderful quilting job that Barb did, but here's a closer look...
Prairie points, now what the heck are those? After much consternation I decided to give them a try because after all, I did spend all that time cutting out 156 - 2 1/2" squares. I found them a bit labor-intensive to complete but the final result was worth it...
I also added some narrow color coordinating borders to frame the quilt as I felt there was just a tad too much white...
And that's it! I love the quilt and it was definitely worth the effort.
