Terry Frey's jeweled butterly, a finished quilt

drumroll, please!

~~~~~ ~~~~~ ~~~~~ ~~~~~

After 145 hours

 of cutting, sewing, pressing, and quilting,

a 4 day battle with bleeding dye,

lots of sweat,

maths

and even some tears,

we have a finished

one of a kind

quilt.

This quilt contains

117 different fabrics,

(many of them fussy cut)

2 battings

(Quilters Dream 100% wool on top of Pellon 80/20)

and 

6 different threads,

and is

- quite possibly -

the most epic quilt

I will ever make.

Terry contacted me Oct 23rd, 2018

and asked if she could commission me to make a butterfly quilt.

We messaged back and forth,

and it turned out

that what she really wanted

was a jewel-tone version 

of Tula Pink's butterfly quilt.

So that is what I set out to make.

I spent a little over a month searching for

and collecting fabrics,

and made my first block

on Nov 28th

Terry wanted me to 

'put my mark' on her quilt,

which I very much appreciated,

because,

as you all know,

I'm not so great with patterns in general.

And honestly,

I'm not the biggest fan of that particular pattern

(shhhhhh).

I bought the pattern,

but I took an awful lot of liberties with it 😉

(And then,

thanks to cutting mistakes,

bad maths,

and who knows what all,

I took several more liberties...🙄)

I swapped out blocks I wasn't crazy about

and replaced them with  a bunch of self-drafted ones

(and self-drafted versions of others)

that were either meaningful,

or would help me create the look I was aiming for,

for the butterfly.

At a glance,

the quilt looks like most of the other 

Tula Pink Butterfly quilts

but when you look more closely,

you can see I changed things up a good bit.

I worked in pairs,

making mirror images of each block,

and made the heart borders 

when we couldn't find a fabric that would work.

I finished the (3 sections) top

in mid-February.

I basted each side separately

because there was no way 

I was going to attempt to quilt

a queen-sized

double-batted quilt

on my domestic machine.

(little side note:

I thread basted one side

and that took for-e-ver,

so I spray basted the other.

The thread basted side has several small tucks and folds

quilted into the back.

So - unless you're hand-quilting,

I'd recommend spray basting with 505)

I started quilting the wing portions on February 26th

(doing my best to quilt mirror images on each side)

and finished them March 7th

We purchased an old longarm on March 8th.

For a few weeks,

I quilted the background fabric on my Janome

while also practicing quilting on the longarm.

Every time I finished a section of background,

I'd add hand quilting with silk button twist

 to outline the butterfly.

(Terry could take or leave the hand-quilting,

but I figured it wouldn't really have my mark on it

if I didn't add a least a little 😏)

Terry was in no rush for the quilt

and I had some other quilts that needed to be made

to celebrate a niece's graduation

and the arrival of a new nephew,

so I put hers on hold

while I worked on those.

Somewhere around that time,

my left shoulder started hurting really badly

and I had seriously reduced range of motion,

which made pushing that quilt

through a domestic machine near impossible.

It suddenly became really important

 to improve my longarm quilting,

because the longer my shoulder hurt,

the more I wanted to be able to finish the butterfly quilt

on the longarm.

So I focused on getting my longarms skills

on par with my domestic machine quilting skills.

Longarming was a little painful,

but not nearly as much as regular machine quilting,

and it had the benefit of being soooo much faster.

When my longarming was finally up to snuff,

I loaded up the unfinished side

and completed it amazingly fast,

and even achieved reasonably decent symmetry.

Then I joined the sides to the center

and finished the rest of the quilting

in just a few days.

(this color is soo wrong 😑 )

Because I quilted the remaining background so fast

I had lots of hand quilting to catch up on...

Then I made and attached the binding over the course of a few days,

and sewed it down with big stitches.

I finished the quilt on Tuesday, Nov 19th,

took a quick celebratory photo,

 and tossed it in the wash.

To my absolute horror,

it came out with pink splotches 

where there shouldn't have been any pink.

After many soaks and washings

it was restored to its proper glory on Friday.

Whew!

And now 

almost exactly one year after I started it,

Terry's Jeweled Butterfly

is finally ready

to go home.

💗

And I will be able to donate 3 sewing machines to Rahab's Rope,

and start saving for the next one 😁.

(You can find progress pictures

with  associated stories, whines, celebrations

and thought processes

  under the tag terrys jeweled butterfly quilt

(all one word though)

on Instagram)

Terry ~ this quilt is filled with love and hope and prayers

and fond memories.

Thanks for hiring me to make it for you 

and helping me save lives.

I love you!!

and --- that's a wrap

Well.

That's that.

Another year down.

Can't say I'm sad to see 2018 end,

though.

~

It's been gloomy and rainy for days,

so it's sort of hard to even think straight.

I have made no plans for the new year.

No 'word', or 'intention', either.

I can tell you though,

I'd really like to do more than just survive.

I've already had plenty of years of that.

~

 Looking back over December:

I sold the Razorback Quilt,

I'm so tickled with where it went, who bought it, and how the purchase came about.
And I am continually humbled that it isn't the wealthy
who partner with me, but ordinary people - with hearts bigger than their wallets 💝

made excellent progress on my current commissioned project

and

finished the circle centered granny square blanket

that I started in September of '17.

I'm pretty proud of myself - learning something new,

and having it turn out so beautifully.

But then I remember that I am 50

(Fifty!?!)

and I feel a bit silly about being proud 

that I learned a little bit of crochet.

~

House-wise:

We finally hung a mirror in the upstairs bathroom

(which sounds way easier than it was...)

but the island/bar received most of the attention.

It was a multi-phase project, and still not complete,

but it's completely usable already :-)

Some day, we'll put black walnut on the bar top,

but this pine should serve us well for many years.

One of the benefits of the bar

that came as a complete surprise,

is that it invites people

(my man, guests....)

to sit and visit with me as I work.

That makes me so happy!!

And, of course, 

I love working in the kitchen

while people I love

play games at the table

across the bar.

~

We also spent a bit of time

adding just a few things to the mudroom 

to help it function properly.

We did okay without a bench and coat hooks

spring thru fall,

but they became more important as the temperature dropped.

I know.
Y'all are so envious of both my 'styling'
and my photography skills.
When I tell you the picture of the other coat rack was too bad to post,
you know it's really bad.

We hosted (most of) Tyler's family 

a few days before Christmas

and it thrilled my heart to look in there

and see the coat racks loaded down

and 25+ pairs of shoes in a jumbled heap.

~

Interestingly,

there was exactly the same number of people

at my sister's house the next day,

when she hosted our side of the family.

I"m not going to do an end of the year round up post; 

there's just not enough energy for that.

But in scrolling through my blog and Instagram feed

I am reminded of just how much we accomplished this year,

in spite of what a long, and challenging year it's been.

I would've liked for the end of 2018

 to have felt more celebratory,

as there really was a lot to celebrate.

I mean -

we hadn't even moved into the house a year ago!

And when we did (all) get moved in

in February,

it was another couple of  months

 before we had a kitchen...

Instead,

I just feel worn out and weary.

The loss of my dad has just sort of made everything 

flat.

Don't misunderstand - I *do* feel blessed,

I just also feel very flat 

(it's really the only way I can describe it)

I find that, 

after almost 11 years

(can you even believe I've had the blog this long?!!)

I am still

pursuing joy.

Razorback Fan

Immediately upon finishing

the Block of the Day quilt,

I sat down and drew up a quilt 

that's been in my head for quite some time.

Then I went on a fabric collecting spree.

digging through every box, shelf, bag, and tub

that even might contain a red, black, or gray fabric.

I amassed a ridiculously large pile boxful,

having previously made

a red quilt,

a gray (and black) (with purple) quilt,

another gray (and blue) quilt,

and a black and white quilt,

and, oh, another quilt that heavily featured gray.

I've made a block here 

That churndash in the upper right didn't make the cut. Not enough contrast.

and a block there,

yes! I found the perfect spot for a bit of Jenean Morrison's fabric :-)

and cut background strips

 when I had a couple of decent chunks of time

(I spent 4 hours just cutting all those suckers!)

Once I had my little design wall filled up,

I made a real (expandable!) design wall

and threw everything up on it,

very neatly arranged the blocks on it

and realized - 

I still had a (very) long way to go!

 I made more blocks every chance I got,

and sewed some together with their background strips.

Sometimes I only had 5 minutes at a time,

sometimes an hour or more.

Then I sewed some more blocks,

and some more pieces together,

and here we are,

3 weeks later,

with a finished
one of a kind
Razorback Fan quilt top!!

There are 122 fabrics

and 52 hours (and 46 minutes) represented
in this 66" x 78" top.

That 52:46 doesn't count any of the hours spent 

designing the quilt

(or any of the blocks that I drew up  myself).

It doesn't include the hours spent gathering fabric,

or driving out to Mulberry in search of actual  Razorback fabric.
(which, incidentally, is rather ugly until you chop it up)

that embroidered white patch was commissioned from a friend :-) and the pink razorback fabric is from Stars for a Star :-)

It doesn't include the time spent
prewashing any fabrics that might bleed
(I'm looking at you, ugly razorback fabric!)

or choosing fabrics for each individual block

(it takes longer than you might think)

That big block is an 'Arkansas Star' - I couldn't find one the size I needed,
and didn't trust my maths to enlarge it and get it just right, so I drafted it myself.
It's paper pieced. Foundation Paper Pieced. Y'all know how much I love that 😏

or re-folding the fabric

after I've cut what I need from it

(when you use over 100 fabrics,

and cut fabric for each block as you make it

 that adds up to a lot of folding)

and it definitely doesn't include time spent

standing in front of the design wall,

pondering.

I will say,
I like it better when I don't know
quite how much time I spend on a project 😉
but
Razorback Fan
 will be for sale as soon as I get it finished
so it seemed prudent to keep track.

I'm eager to get to the quilting;
I've already got a pretty good idea
of what I'm wanting to do.

joining Amanda Jean and the other finishers