I know I have written a lot about my Hope Lives in Pink Houses project, this should be the end of the story. I promise not to make it the subject of any more blog posts from this day forward but I wanted to share the finish with you.
I threw the layers on the frame yesterday. My quilting machine is a short arm, it's a Pfaff Grand Quilter 1200 on a Grace Start Right frame, which comes with lots of pro's and plenty of con's. I love my machine for all it allows me to do and hate it for all the limitations it throws in my face when I want to do anything particular...like freehand straight lines for example or quilt into an area that spans beyond it's 9" reach. This little wall hanging needed more than an all over meander and I was gung-ho to practice some new-to-me FMQ skills; my guild mate & friend, Linda, would be proud of me for stepping out of my comfy, tried & true, stippled box. So with her in mind, I swirled my little heart out, tossed in some pebbles and gave the trees some texture but I ran into problems with the straight lines. The carriage is pretty sensitive and stitching anything that is remotely straight free hand poses a bit of a problem. I couldn't possibly eat enough bananas to steady my hands to achieve nice clean straight lines.
I should probably have pulled out the wonky, wobbly stitches & resewn them on my regular machine but as I have mentioned in the past I believe in moving forward. So I just kept going...wobbling along all the way to the finish line ending with binding, sleeve and label.
It's done! I am more or less happy with it. Overall I think it looks pretty good, at a distance at least. I learned a lot, had some fun and decided I need to investigate a new foot for my wee Grand Quilter that will allow me to get some rulers. Yes, rulers. I said it. Though I hate them for some applications I just might learn to love them for others.
Now, all that said, it's whiskey time.
I don't have a shamrock inked on my neck for nothing!
