Mom's 99-bottles quilt

Last week my son and I were over to my Mom's for dinner.  This time I remembered to take the pictures of her quilts.  So, over the next few days I will be sharing them with you.  Right now I am completely distracted with reading all the nutrition books, primarily about Paleo.  I just can't stop ready.  So needless to say I have not gotten anything around here done.

Here is the first picture of Mom's 99-bottles quilt.  Mom wanted the quilt to fit her double bed and hang down the bed a lot, so we decided to make it all most queen size.  Mom saw this pattern in a magazine that she purchased and had to make it.  She didn't look at the pattern though and was very surprised to find out that the small nine patches used 1/2" finished blocks.  That kind of put a damper on things.

Mom doesn't mind challenging herself from time to time, but she mainly makes quilts to have some mindless sewing.  When she read the pattern she almost put it aside.  I say almost, because back up to another time I went over for dinner, when mom was telling me about this quilt.  I saw her face light up when she was talking about it and I saw the light go off when she basically said she wasn't going to do it.

At that point I asked mom for some paper and a pencil.  I explained to her that where there is a will there is a way.  So I took the pattern and redrafted it.  Instead of 1/2" squares I made them 1" still small, but now more manageable.  I had to reduce the amount of repeats, the amount of large squares and the sashings.  In the end we had a quilt that not only became more manageable but also fit her bed better. Her face lite up again and it pleased me to see it.

    

For the next few days Mom went through all of her fabric scraps cutting up 3 1/2" squares for the alternating squares and what was left into 1 1/2" squares for the nine patches.  When she had a fair amount done she went to the fabric store and bought a piece of yardage for the white that she wanted to be all the same.  As you can see, the white is what holds the design all together.  It's the constants that is sometimes needed when making a scrap quilt.

Here are a couple of close up pictures to show the detail of the quilt and the variety of fabrics that where used.  Mom did not buy any coloured fabric to make this quilt and do you know what?  It doesn't even look like she made a dent in her fabric.  Mom did a great job, the quilt turned out beautiful.  She just finished quilting and binding it last week.

Today is a new day and thing are going to change.  I have to come back to the land of the living.  Researching all of this reading material has me feeling like I am back to school, but my "paper" is handed in (I think I have a handle on it), and I am already using what I have learned.  I feel confident enough now to get back to "normal" and get some quilting done.

I now have four quilts pinned and ready to quilt.  I have to get to them.  I am surprised how far behind I feel by just taking the week off to research.  I have to get going on the appliqué blocks for Tiny Town. We have been assigned blocks 5 & 9 to have complete by our next class on Sept 19th.

I also have some work I am still working on for others and some of my own stuff. It will all get done. I enjoy the challenge of making sure that it does get done.

Hope you enjoyed my Mom's quilt. There will be more to follow, until I can get some of my stuff done.

Enjoy your day!