I'm an environmental scientist and the three R's (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) are really important to me. I save every usable scrap of fabric - down to 1.5" squares for quilting cottons. I absolutely love making scrap quilts. They are my favorites. I keep all my solid colored scraps in a bin and that bin was overflowing. I received the Bubble Lights print on Cotton Sateen from Minerva and decided to make a quilt to use it for the backing.
I pulled out each scraps, then selected pieces that were colors I saw in the Bubble Lights print. The print is so colorful so I had a whole rainbow of colors to select from. I then needed to figure out a pattern. One quilting technique I have been wanting to master is sewing curves. I thought that a quilt full of drunkards path blocks would compliment the bubbly pattern in the Bubble Lights print. I decided my quilt blocks needed some "rules" so I put my fabrics into two piles - cool tones and warm tones. I then decided that the cool tones would make the concave piece and the warm tones would make the convex piece.
I initially wanted to piece the blocks randomly, but found that I didn't like some of the color combinations. I sewed the pieces in color groupings that I felt were visually appealing while also making sure there was a good variety in each color. After all my blocks were made, I set about pressing them and had to fix a few where I didn't catch enough of the seam allowance. Many of my blocks have wrinkles and folds, and I have left those imperfections. I named this quilt "Learning Curve" as that is what I was doing - I was learning to sew curves and felt like to be true to myself I needed to leave those small imperfections to show that when you are learning, it's not always going to look perfect. Many people focus on the imperfection without realizing when it is combined with everything else, those mistakes and imperfections disappear and become very hard to find.
Cotton Sateen makes for a luxurious quilt back and I was so excited to try the Minerva Exclusive Bubble Lights Cotton Sateen for a quilt back. This cotton sateen is almost 56" wide. It has a very soft and silky texture. It is not as heavy as other cotton sateens I have used, but it doesn't affect it's use as a quilt back and would make it especially great for apparel. Some finely woven cottons like a cotton sateen can show puncture holes - especially when quilting, but this cotton sateen did fantastic. I normally put in a new needle before quilting on tighter weave fabrics and forgot this time. When I checked the quilt back as I rolled it on my longarm, I was relieved to notice that the puncture holes were not noticeable at all. I would definitely use the Minerva exclusive cotton sateen for another quilt.
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