{Blogger's Quilt Festival:Fall 2012 Edition}

It's {Quilt Market} time which also means it's time for the {Blogger's Quilt Festival} hosted by {Amy's Creative Side}. My entry for this quilt festival is the SWOON quilt I made as a 75th birthday quilt for a very special family member.

I fell in love with the SWOON quilt pattern and ordered it from Thimble Blosssoms. I wasn't sure who I would make be making it for but decided to use a fat quarter of Chrysalis by Sanae for Moda that I had purchased a few month earlier. 

I made my first block in October of 2011. I hadn't been quilting for very long at that point in time and this was the most difficult quilt block I had attempted. I gathered all my material, carefully cut out the pieces for the first block and started sewing.  I used a Singer machine that I bought for my daughter when she was in Junior High School. The only presser foot was the one attached to the machine and even though I thought I was sewing a 1/4" seam it seems I was a bit off. The finished block was supposed to be 24" and mine finished at 23". Oops. I figured as long as I was consistent in my inaccurate seaming, all the blocks would end up the same size and my finished quilt would be a little smaller than the pattern stated.

 I ended up sewing two more blocks between October and December 2011. All of them finishing up at 23". Great. 

Fast forward to January 2012......I purchased a new Singer machine specially designed for quilters. It came with a huge selection of presser feet, the most important being a 1/4" foot. Excellent. Now I'll be sewing accurate 1/4" seams. I had set aside the SWOON blocks and busied myself with making a few other quilts. Once I realized the SWOON blocks would make a great quilt for an upcoming birthday celebration, I pulled out all the fabric, cut another block out and started sewing with my new machine. This block ended up being my favorite.

And, yes, this block finished at 24". A whole inch bigger than the three other blocks. There was no way to make this work with the other three blocks so I had to pull out the old machine and make another block with my familiar inaccurate seaming. So, after a little agonizing and aggravation she was done. 

This quilt was quilted by Melissa at {Sew Shabby Quilting}. I picked out an allover pattern of loops and butterflies, which fit perfectly with the butterfly theme of the fabrics. Melissa had her done and back to me in little more than a week. I was so happy with how this turned out. She finished at 53x53 and was delivered to her new home in September of 2012. 

Thanks for peeking at my {Blogger's Quilt Festival} entry. I'm really enjoying this quilting journey. Click  over to see the beautiful entries from the quilting community.

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