It’s been pretty exciting lately in our corner of Sarasota! Several months ago, my friends, Laura and Tim, approached me about quilting a very special quilt for their shop. They told me that their Quilt Shop, Cotton Patch, had been chosen to be one of the 10 Best featured quilt shops in the country by Better Homes and Gardens Quilt Sampler Magazine! So, Laura designed and pieced the quilt top, and passed it to me for quilting. A very exciting event for a longarm quilter! The quilt is a Snail’s Trail combined with a 54 40 or Fight block, done in the beautiful colors of blues and greens we see here on the Gulf Coast of Florida. We spent several days in the quilting design process, because I wanted the quilting to be beautiful, complimentary and appropriate for the quilt, and something I haven’t seen before. I think we came up with a winner! Here are some pictures of the first quilt, during the quilting process:
We never imagined our quilt would be chosen to be on the COVER of the Quilt Sampler Magazine! There isn’t really a way to describe it, but I can say it is so much more exciting to have done this with a friend! Laura was the first quilter I met when we moved here, all those years ago. To be able to share the excitement with a close friend makes something like this even better – I think we have both been all smiles since we found out a few weeks ago!
We did two quilts. The first one, which is the quilt on the magazine cover, was done on my Gammill Classic Plus longarm machine. It was all hand guided. Fabric are batiks, batting is Hobbs 80/20. For the thread, I only use top quality threads. The first quilt I used YLI – Yarn Loft International threads. On the top is YLI silk 100, and YLI Invisible Nylon by Harriet Hargrave. On the back, I used YLI Soft Touch, 100% cotton, in soft blue.
For the second quilt, that one was quilted on my Handi Quilter machine, using the Pro Stitcher and Art and Stitch software. We changed the quilting design slightly, adding curves in the lines inside the diamonds, and a less dense curl feather in the other half of the Snail’s Trail block, where the first one had dense, formal feathers. The second quilt also has Hobbs 80/20 bleached batting, and I changed the threads to Auriful invisible nylon and Auriful Mako 50/2 100% cotton on the top, and Wonderfil fine thread on the back. Here are the pics:
Can it get any better??? How exciting for Laura, Tim, and I to have this happen, and what an honor to be chosen for the cover! The celebration began this weekend, with a kick off party Friday night, and then a celebration all day on Saturday! Kits are available for the quilt at: http://www.cottonpatchquiltshop.com/
Thank you for looking! Hugs, Cindye