Ain't Love A Stitch: My First Quilt (of course it's for Marlee)

I am a procrastinator.... it takes me forever to do anything... mostly because I can't make up my mind on details... for example I started this quilt back in November of 2012.... that's right... a year ago.... and I am finally getting around to blogging about it...I'll throw in dates here and there so you can see my lack of progress...

here goes...

November 2012

I have spent months browsing through Pinterest and YouTube on the subject of Quilting. I have been dreaming about quilting. It's about time I started one. I found a pretty easy pattern on Pinterest, which you can see right here..

http://www.polkadotchair.com/2010/08/snuggly-bricks-quilt-tuesday-tutorial.html

I rummaged through all my fat quarters to find just the right fabrics.....

I began cutting all my squares

only to find the pattern was a little wrong....

I didn't have enough fabric for the length it was supposed to be...

no worries though....

I can make it work....

I am resourceful like that.

While I was at it.. I expanded on the pattern to make it longer... see.... that's using my head... I decided that whatever fabric I add needed to be the same... meaning whatever I add is going to be used for all the extension pieces...

that's when I thought about a crib sheet. I cut off all the elastic and ironed it and I was surprised at the amount of fabric I just gained.

I cut out all the additional pieces...and laid out the pattern on the floor again and numbered them ...

once I was happy with the order... I gathered them all up...and they sat there.... for 3 weeks.. ... until I decided ok... let me start this... so I get out my brand new machine... and the drama begins....

December 2012

I pull out my new Singer and low and behold... I can't get the tension right... over and over again I change the tension... turn it up... turn it down... Ugh... nothing is working!!!

Enter my OLD sewing machine... my Brother XL-5500...download the manual... see the proper tension settings...turn a few dials... and I'm good to go!!! Woo Hoo... let the sewing begin....5 weeks after my intended start date... but its still progress nonetheless.

so I start sewing all my blocks together and placed them to see if I liked the pattern... Guess what????

I didn't like the sheet....
it just didn't fit in for me....

So I ripped it all out and back to Joann's I go....and I found my backing fabric....

and another that will be good for the extra rows and blocks...

so it was back to the cutting board and sewing machine I go..... now remember I said I was a procrastinator....now it's December 13th.

Time is

passing me by.... tick tock.... again... as usual...by this time I had given up on any thoughts that I might actually give this to Marlee for Christmas... Ha ha ha... that's so funny!!!

December 19th....

Lots of sewing and ironing and sewing and ironing....

And I finally finally finally have my quilt top... by the way... its December 30th!!!

Still have work to do....

let's see how long it'll take now.

February 11, 2013

That's right... I said February.....

It turns out that I had a lot of the extra blocks fabric left over so I decided to use it for the backing.

More cutting... and sewing and ironing... and I had a quilt backing...

Looked real nice.... for a minute...

Then I messed it up...

Again....while trying to square up my quilt and cut corners by doubling up my fabric... I ended up cutting a little too much off the edge and sliced into the good fabric... Right in the middle of the quilt... sooooooooooooooo now I have to change the backing... UGH!!!

And I can't find any pics of my mistake... which is a good thing... I still had to quilt it... and that was an experience I'd rather not go in to right now.. (and I can't find those pics either... Windows 8 SUCKS)... so now

it is

SEPTEMBER!!!

Time flies huh??

Now it's time to bind this thing