overdue: a quilt

there’s a new art exhibit up at my library.  it’s quilts from the local modern quilt guild.  they fill all of the available art rail space (the most we’ve had up all year–all the staff love it and i’ve heard lots of positive feedback from patrons too!).  here are some in the children’s area:

and here are some near the magazine and adult study area.  oh wait.  one of those looks familiar…

it’s my quilt!  happy dance, happy dance, it’s finally done!!!!  (see previous posts about it here and here and here) the title of this quilt is “overdue” because not only did i start this quilt three years ago, but i almost always have books overdue on my library card because i want to read too many at once.

although this is “my” quilt because i own it and i designed it, i almost don’t feel like i can say that i made it myself.  it is definitely the most collaborative quilt i have ever made.  first of all, a huge thank you to the women of the common threads quilt bee (round 2) who contributed strips of “books” for this quilt.  without your help, this quilt would have had much less variety in fabrics and, honestly, would have never gotten finished.  i had no idea, when i designed this, how tricky it would be to sew strips like this together and not have it turn completely, wildly wonky.  you are all champs and now that i’m done, i kind of want to start another round of the bee…..

my second contributor was my mother who (see above note about wildly wonky blocks) straightened up a few places where i’d joined several contributed blocks in a row less than squarely and made squaring up the bottom edge impossible without drastically shortening (and slanting) a whole row of books.  mom, you have way more patience for being careful than i do.  a million thanks.

and last, but possibly most, i’d like to thank the amazing cindy anderson of in a stitch quilting for taking my quilt from great to absolutely incredible with her marvelous quilting skills!  i met cindy through the modern quilt guild here in town and i loved working with her so much that i’m already plotting my next quilt to have her work on!  cindy was so patient and understanding as i waffled about what quilting design to use, what thread color to use, how the heck to finally square up this enormous thing…  i gave her the merest scribble of my design idea and she not only “got it” she developed it into a design i love even more than i’d imagined.  the idea to connect the lines between the books was a last-minute “aha moment” and she easily grabbed onto the idea and ran with it (again, after a sketchy scribble photographed with my phone and e-mailed to her).  her fees are ridiculously reasonable and the value of my quilt increased way more from her work on it than the amount i paid.  love, love, love it!

i also have to point out that i’m particularly proud of the binding.  i loved the no-border look of the top so much that i didn’t want binding to disturb it, so i bound the whole thing in white, then appliqued 8 “books” on the edges, lining up with the ends of each row.

i am not loving the library florescent lighting on the quilt in these shots, so maybe when the quilt show is done (end of june) i’ll have to take a few more pictures of it on my bed.  apologies if you get sick of seeing this quilt, but it certainly makes me happy!

p.s. one more thank you to marie and cindy (yes, my quilter cindy) for whip-stitching a rod pocket (by hand) onto the back of my quilt the evening of the installation in the library.  i found myself trying to direct a dozen quilters in how to hang what seemed like mountains of quilts up on the library walls (where’s the ladder?  where are the rods?  do you have fishing line?  scissors?  tape measure?) while doing my own last-minute prep work and these two ladies calmly stepped in and took over my frantic stitching and finished it for me.  thank you, thank you!