I've made a lot of quilts with the intent to give them to family members and have pretty much covered all of my family in quilts now. I want to also be able to gift quilts to people in my life that I appreciate. First up on that list was my coworker that has assisted me daily since the later part of 2018. Since I work remotely, I don't see my coworker very often. We were both going to be in the office for a mandatory event, so I asked him if he would like a quilt from me. I don't like to just give a quilt to someone without knowing if they would want one. He said he would and I told him to talk to his wife and see if there was a certain pattern and colors she might want. I think we can all agree that the woman of the house typically decides what decor items come into the home.
His wife selected the Winter Solstice Quilt pattern by Patti Carey of Patti's Patchwork. The wife also indicated that she liked the brown color version on the website. I immediately bought the pattern and went shopping for fabric. More on that in a minute. My coworker had so many questions for me as I made the quilt. He asked how the different elements in the quilt were made and I told him the trees were made from flying geese blocks and the mountains were delectable mountain blocks. I had him google the instructions for both so he could see how they were made.
My coworker does a lot of mapping work and has a background in geology, so I thought the malachite pantograph from Urban Elementz would be perfect for his quilt. I showed him the two pantographs I was considering - malachite and woodgrain. When he saw the malachite design he remarked how cool it was and how it looked like a topographic map. I knew then - it was the right choice.
He was amazed to hear that my quilting machine pretty much did the quilting on it's own. He asked me to send him a video when I did the quilting. I did and of course took a few photos during the quilting. I used a grey thread for the quilting.
I also had to send him a photo of the quilt top draped over the longarm frame before I quilted it to show how big the machine and frame are. My Tin Lizzie sites on a 12 foot long frame.
Selecting the fabrics was the hardest part. I think it was because I wanted the quilt to be perfect. I was so worried about it not being "perfect" that I actually took apart and redid a large swath of the quilt. Below is what it looked like initially. I liked it, but something felt "off".
I moved a few blocks around to see if I liked the "flow" of the colors and trees better. I thinkI even made a few new trees at this point as well.
I also took a black and white photo. This is something I do frequently to get a better visual of the tonal changes in the colors in a quilt.
Then one morning as I walked past my design wall to the laundry room - where I do my workouts, I finally realized what was visually bothering me. It was the darkest brown value I had picked. I realized, it was too reddish and kind of clashed with the cooler hue of the other prints. Instead of working out that morning, I pulled down each and every block with that reddish brown fabric and made a list of what needed to be replaced.
I had to find a suitable fabric replacement in my stash. I had no time to go and do any shopping. I didn't have a lot of extra fabric to use and had to get creative and move mountains around. Most of the fabrics I used were Northcott Stonehenge line of fabrics. I had hoped to buy the same fabrics used in the brown version from the website, but they were not all available from the store I shopped at locally. I also had used some grunge and abstract prints I had picked up at another shop and pulled from my stash. This quilt calls for 12 different fabrics. It took some adjustments to the design, but I was finally able to settle on a layout that felt right to me.
I'm happy to report that my coworker loved the quilt. I made it and gifted it to him to show him how much I appreciated his help. I honestly don't know what I would do without him. We both handle Texas oversight and it keeps us both extremely busy. It's not something I could handle easily on my own. I did the job without him before he started, but it was soooo hard. When he started and I was assigned as his mentor, I was thrilled that I would finally have someone to help me. He has become such a competent coworker that he can easily fill in for me whenever I am out. He had to fill in for me for 6 months when I went on a detail and I know he did not enjoy it. All that to say - it really means a lot to me that he has stuck around and continued to work with me and puts up with my bossiness. So when he sent me a gift card to thank me for the quilt, I wanted to yell at him. I didn't want anything in return. But it did make me feel good that he valued and appreciated the work.
