Monday, January 7, 2013

Jungle Elephant Quilt DONE!

Well good grief, Charlie Brown!  Not only did I think I would NEVER get this quilt pieced and on the frame, I was beginning to think I would NEVER get it quilted and bound - WHEW!  Finally, I can FINALLY say I finished this Big Boy:




I know I'm including ALOT of photo downloading time, but I thought you might enjoy the close-ups of quilting and application techniques, since the long-shot photos don't due the fabrics and threads justice - they are just gorgeous!  (Complete info on threads, etc., on another earlier post HERE - and I caution you, that post is even heavier w/photos.)



Turned out pretty good if I say so myself ;-)  I LOVED working on this quilt, too - it was an evolutionary-type quilt as it didn't start out with any kind of pattern, just some elephant embroidery blocks, some vibrant colored hand-dyed batik fabrics and some, thank goodness, much needed inspiration!  

I had a ball quilting it, primarily with my favorite type of quilting, McTavishing and again, I think it gave this quilt additional movement and character that enhanced the batiks and the embroidery quite nicely.

Binding this dude was a little challenging:

Thank heaven for little card table...

Blind hemming the binding w/clear monopoly



The clear/invisible monopoly thread is such a life-saver w/multiple fabric colored binding, as with this quilt, and is virtually undetectable when applied in this fashion.  I cannot however, take the credit for this amazing technique.  

As with many, if not most of my quilting/sewing ideas, this one has been permanently 'borrowed' from professional quilt artist, Leah Day:
Part I

Part II

These videos are a little long, but if you are in need of learning how to apply quilt binding completely by machine, then these are for you and well worth your time.  I use this technique on ALL my gift/charitable projects because it's FAST and stands up to repeated laundering - a Win/Win in my book.  I've used all kinds of threads to apply, but my favorites are clear/invisible monopoly and matching embroidery/quilting threads from my quilt.  

When I use clear monopoly and/or embroidery thread, I follow it up w/pre-wound polyester bobbins (the same kind I use in my embroidery machine will fit in the machine I apply my bindings with, both are Vikings, so I have these bobbins in bulk and on hand most of the time, and another time-saver for me ;-)

Alrighty then, just need the quilt label finished up and I'm golden.  But for now, I'm off for some shut-eye so I can get rested up and try to get caught up with Bonnine Hunter's annual Mystery quilt, Easy Street, 'cause the Monday Morning 'linky' is in a few short hours!

Later,
~Deb

PS...
For the complete Jungle Elephant story, you can go to the original post w/updates here: 

2 comments:

  1. Deb the quilt is sooo nice! I love 'create-as-you-go' quilts. They tend turn into such original works of art!

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  2. Thank YOU, Miss Katie - it was FUN and stressful all at the same time! LOL, typically I don't fret this much over a 'create-as-you-go' quilt if it's for me or a charitable contribution, but this one was for a very special, long-time friend of our family who is really 'family', soooo I was very conscious of wanting it to be 'one-of-a-kind' and 'perfect', all at the same time...My youngest daughter loves it and told me it's 'over the top' as far as she's concerned so I think I'm golden - we'll keep our fingers crossed!

    The hubs and I have had this nasty flu for the past several days that's been goin' 'round here in the Midwest, so I'm not getting near as much done in the New Year as I'd planned. But at least today, I finally feel like I might live! LOL, what a flu this one has been!!

    Take care and Thanks again for your kind words and taking the time t stop by...
    ~Deb

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