WIP Wednesday: La Habana Vieja, Part 2. #quilt

Barbara is still out of town on a business trip. That left me with a sewing room, and an unfinished quilt.  I don’t have anywhere near her experience with quilting, but what I lack in judgment, I more than make up for in confidence!  With a little bit of help via texting, and FaceTime, I decided to try to complete my quilt top.

I will jump to the punch line and tell you that I’m pretty pleased with the result. It was not an entirely smooth process.   One would never think that replacing a bobbin would be such a big deal.  Or, that cleaning up the tangled mess of thread when you place the bobbin incorrectly would be such a challenge!

I also learned an important lesson about not keeping your fabric nearby when you are cutting on the cutting table. Fortunately, I had enough fabric that I was able to work around this, but, for a moment, I thought I was going to have to use this patched fabric. My wife assured me that this would have been fixable in the quilting, so, if I make the same mistake again, I won’t use such bad language.

I started by doing the  appliqué of the fruit. I used a walking foot. After that, I switched to the regular foot, which, I’m sure, has an actual name. On a few occasions, I had to go back and redo seams, and, I messed up and put the seam of the back stripe on backwards, not once, but twice! Finally finished, here is how it looks now.

My wife and I both had birthdays last month. My gift was this neat pencil, for use with the Paper 53 iPad app. I have primarily used it for quilt design. Here you can see my concept drawings for the completed quilt. I’m planning on quilting palm trees on the side panels. For the smaller side panels, I’m planning vines in green, with hibiscus blossoms in pink. Too ambitious?

We found a nice backing fabric. It carries on the tropical theme. I’m not foolhardy enough to cut this one, cut the batting and pin this one by myself, particularly given how large the piece is. Barbara is still off working for another week, and the following week we go on vacation with our kids, so this quilt is going to be a wip for another few weeks!

 I’d love advice on how to quilt the center balcony? I will stitch the slats for the windows, and plan to appliqué the iron railings. What about the rest? Stitch in a ditch? Follow my lines? And, what about the stained glass window? I want to preserve the look of colored glass. All ideas welcomed.

Finally, Albert was awarded Dog of the Day last week at Furst Choice Doggy Daycare. It has nothing to do with quilting, but we were so proud of him!

Also linking up with Maker Monday today. Check out her beautiful origami birds!