A Paper-Piecing Finish

I’ve been doing a lot of paper piecing lately, with successes and seam ripping along the way. My latest finish? This Dutch Windmill quilt, designed by Red Delicious Life, blocks sewn by NHMQG members, and pieced, quilted, and bound by me. All it needs is an afternoon at the spa, and I’ll send it off to an appreciated employee of Boston Children’s Hospital who serves the Down syndrome community.

My designated quilt holder is out of town, so an old stone wall did the job.

I’m thrilled with how this project turned out. I provided guild members with the navy and white fabric, and they could use whatever solid scraps they had on hand to finish off their blocks. The bold, graphic design and the anything-goes color scheme create a quilt suited, I think, for anyone with a modern aesthetic.

It was fun to see different colors juxtaposed in the quilt.
I love the combination of dusty blue, sage green, pale aqua, and coral-y carrot here.
Could it be the palette for a future quilt?

I’m a straight-line quilter, and settling on an approach to the quilting was difficult. There’s quite a bit of bulk at the ends of the navy diamonds, and I wasn’t sure my machine could work through it neatly. I chose to avoid those intersections and sew with my regular foot along the seam lines in the white/striped sections. I had lots of threads to bury when it was all said and done, but this plan was worth the extra work.

Two lines of quilting along these seams did the trick.

I thought of the back as a foil to all of the solids in the top. I chose a color that appears in the top—green—and found fabric in my stash to create a mostly monochromatic back. I like it. This quilt needed something with personality on the flip side.

I used my usual approach to piecing the back.

It’s not just me who has the paper-piecing bug these days. I spotted a paper-piecing finish over at Anja Quilts recently, and Never Just Jennifer has made good progress on her version of Icy Waters. How about you? Have you been sewing through fabric and paper at your machine lately?

Linking up to Show Off Saturday, Let’s Bee Social, Needle and Thread Thursday, and Scraptastic Tuesday ...