Birthday boy

Well, I finished the I Spy quilt Friday night, so I even had one day left until Ernst's birthday party today! (I finished Hugo's birthday quilt last February at 10 pm the night before his birthday)



After sandwiching the quilt I decided I didn't want the quilting to 'spoil' the world map on the backside, so I quilted the world map in the meridians and the circles of latitude, thinking it wouldn't matter much on the frontside with all the colourful patches. Outside the map I meandered along the seams on the frontside. I now regret quilting the world map, because it makes the front side too 'quilted' - just meandering all the seams would have been much nicer. But alas, it's done - if I ever make another I Spy quilt (which won't be for a long time) I'll do it differently.



I also wish I had put the map on its side, so it would be easier to look at when it's lying on the bed, but that can't be helped either.



Ernst liked the quilt, but of course his Thomas the Tank Engine railway set was a lot more interesting... ;-)



I'm very glad it's finished and have promised myself that after I've made the rosy quilt for our bed I will not make a large quilt again for a while - quilting it on a domestic sewing machine isn't much fun... (I have a Janome DC 3050, not a quilting machine at all, but I'm quite happy with it and besides, we don't have the money for me to buy another one for a long time yet! This one's only 18 months old, so I should be able to use it for years and years to come) And small quilts can be very beautiful as well, and are a good way for me to try different techniques and themes.

I went to the Queensland Quilt Show yesterday and enjoyed it very much! Here you can view the winning quilts. My favourite without any doubt was 'Squared Up' by Lisa Walton, which won second prize in the Commmercially Quilted section and the Trophy for Best Use of Colour.
I also noticed again that I love pictorial quilts (there was a very nice one depicting a Queenslander); I'd really like to try and make one.

It's a bit disheartening to be at such a show and see so many beautiful quilts, and to realise how far distant you yourself are from that level of quilting, and wonder if you will ever reach it... Last week at the beginners course all my triangles were wonky - I'm definitely not a triangle person! ;-) And I suspect I'm not a traditional quilts person either, so there may be hope for me in other areas...

Next weekend I'll go to the quilt retreat. I'm not sure what I'll work on there - don't feel like starting another large project yet, maybe I'll just make another bag (still have to do a Bow Bag!)... Or shall I have a go at creating some ATCs, I'd like to do that too?...

I'll let you know what it has become in the next posting - I'm quite sure I won't have anything to show or tell here before the weekend!