Blogger's Quilt Festival - Fall 2012

I've enjoyed it very much from the time I first saw it, I even participated in the last two editions but this time... I almost missed it.
Almost, but not quite, luckily.

The quilt I'd like to show you today is the one I made for my grandma in the summer.
Those of you who visit my blog have already seen it, but I hope you won't mind looking at it again.

This quilt is very special to me, especially because it was a gift to my grandma and because she likes it.
Also, we had lots of fun with a little photo shoot - I took photos of the quilt and my sis of me and the whole scene. (And my husband was patiently holding the quilt, for which I'm ever so grateful.)

photo by my sis

As for some more quilty/sewy reasons for why this quilt is special, there are many of those, too.
It was my first 100% hand quilted quilt and I loved the process very much. It did take a long time but was very relaxing and somehow felt just right for this quilt.

It was also the first quilt for which I used Y-seams. It came out of laziness really. I didn't want to create long strips of sashing, so instead I used big triangles for the edges, and the way I assembled the pieces left me with no choice but to brave the Y-seams. They weren't as scary as I'd thought.
And finally, although at first sight all the blocks are yellow, the fabric arrangement in each is slightly different and I really enjoyed making sure that no two blocks were identical. 

Let me just add some technical details:

• Quilt Measurements: approximately 50" x 84"
• Special Techniques used, if any: hand quilting, Y-seams
• Quilted by me
• Best category: bed quilt, two colour quilt

(And my entry number is 550, woo-hoo)

And now it's time to get inspired by other festival entries. 

Keep calm

KEEP

CALM

AND

SING

 
And if are not sure how to sing it, here is a little hint:

Coming back to sewing, the letters are almost ready, they just need lots of pressing, and the English paper pieced ones need some more background fabric to become full blocks. As you can see, I resorted to EPP for this K too. I find Ks rather tricky, and since my self-imposed challenge required no peeking how others dealt with them, EPP it needed to be. And a nice change it was, too. 
Now it's back to deconstructing shirts fabric cutting. I already have about a hundred squares: 

I just need... well... about a hundred more.   

creak... swoosh...swoosh...ekhe...ekhe

Ok, now that I've removed all the dust and cobwebs, I can show you a bit of what I've been up to.
First of all, I'm very happy I managed to finish the wedding quilt for my little sister (cousin, that is)in time. The only thing I did not managed was to take a decent photo of the quilt. Still, I can show you some quilt details.

the dark side

the dark side - after it's been washed

the light side

and the binding is scrappy

Also, these plans I hinted at in the previous post stopped being a secret, so let me present you the beginnings of a quilt for my husband:

I started with EPP letters but then tried some improv ones and (don't laugh at me too much) I love the feeling of freedom that goes with this sort of piecing, so I'm sewing most of them this way.

Can you guess what the full text will say? (I assure you it contains no swearing).