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Bloggers Quilt Festival Entry

Posted by Amy on April 17th, 2009



This post is my entry in the Bloggers Quilt Festival. This is basically a repeat of a post from March on my Back to Amsterdam quilt. If you read that post already, you’ve seen all there is to see here!

Back to Amsterdam Original Quilt

This quilt is called “Back to Amsterdam”, and is inspired by the city itself, which I visited on a business trip in 2007. This quilt is entirely of my own design and creation, which in part explains why it has taken me so long to complete. I’m an excessive planner, though I admit it doesn’t always do much good or prevent all the problems I hope it will prevent. The completed quilt is 48″ wide by 65.5″ high.

Back to Amsterdam - quilt back

I opted to do four big stripes of the “brick” fabrics for the back. I really needed something a bit calmer than all the bustle that is on the front. The label is on the bottom right corner in the same color fabric so as not to be distracting.

This was my first time doing machine applique, and I found it pretty fun, though next time I will definitely use a bit wider stitch. I’m a bit nervous about how secure these are (or aren’t, as the case may be), but they all held up for the first washing, so, so far so good!

Back to Amsterdam - Detail 1

In the end, I couldn’t bear to do an all-over quilting pattern or anything that cut into the appliqued gables. I thought it would be distracting from all the hard work I’d done! So, I started with ditch stitching around all the blocks and the major seams.

Back to Amsterdam - Detail 2

I opted to do free motion concentric squares (or rectangles) inside each of the little windows. This kept me from having to do a lot of crazy manipulations with the bulk of the quilt. I left the “doors” unquilted to make them stand out a bit more.

Back to Amsterdamm - Detail 3

The brick, the gables, and the “sky” have been left unquilted. For the sashing between the rows of houses I used one of the curvy quilting stitches on my machine. I love this — it reminds me of the canals on which most of these houses are situated in real life.

Back to Amsterdam - Back detail

The border quilting is a two-inch grid on point. More reinforcement here of how much I was bored by grid quilting. Definitely off my list for a while unless it’s the only thing that will work. Part of my decision making on the quilting had to do with how it was going to look from the back, because it was going to be very obvious on the solid colors. I think it turned out pretty well!

To keep it from getting too crazy, I bound it in the same color as the border (thanks to my hubby for that suggestion!).

And one last look at the whole thing.

Back to Amsterdam Original Quilt

Inspiration shot taken by me in Amsterdam, October 2007.

Gables of Amsterdam

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April 17th, 2009 | 39 comments so far | Categories: Giveaways, Festivals, etc., My Quilts, Quilts | Print this Page
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