OMG -- Another Finish

Four months of One Monthly Goal and I've got four (4!) finishes.  And every one has come from my UFO list.  Can you see the grin on my face?  Yep, I'm a happy camper quilter.   I will say most of these didn't have much in the way of finishing.  This month's only needed a border, the backing sewn together, quilted and bound.  And, best of all I pretty much knew what I wanted to do with it too.  The weather has been cloudy/rainy for the last few days so I haven't been able to do an outdoor photo shoot with this basket quilt.  But here it is hanging on my design wall. 

And, a closeup of the quilting motif inside the handles. (Remember this post where I wanted your opinions about which motif to use.  Most everybody said the top one which is what I did. Thanks for the opinions.) 

My last picture is a close up of the border quilting and the binding.  Why show that?  My main reason is to show my machine stitching on the binding.  I machine sew the binding on to the back first, then I pull it around to the front and sew that down my machine.  I find I am getting quite good at it.  It sure makes it faster for me to finish quilts.  

One issue I had with quilting this quilt is I didn't have very much excess backing on the sides.  Because my longarm is only 18" I would have needed to turn this quilt 90º to do the sides in one pass.  Um, couldn't do that because I need more backing fabric to attach it to my leaders.  What to do? What to do?  

I finally decided to take it off the longarm and use my domestic machine to stitch three straight rows in the borders.  Worked like a charm.  I used my walking foot and before I knew it the quilting was done. 

Now it is time to figure out what to work on in May.  I was just looking at my calendar and I realize I have very little to do in May.  We'll be at the beach house with friends for part of a week, and then I'll be in Maryland attending the annual FCQ retreat.  (Interpret that as 2.5 days of constant sewing and lots of quilty friends to talk to.) So I could choose something that will take a little more to do than I usually do.  After seeing this quilt (the first quilt pictured) in the show I decided to show the sincerest form of flattery and copy it!  Except, I also found my notes about what to do and it was exactly the same.  So here is the beginning of that effort. 

There are several things I figured out from this -- I need to pay attention to where the colors are.  These rail blocks were to be made from warm or cool colors.  And, I really need to make sure the blocks are horizontal/vertical on one row and vertical/horizontal on the other.  The first block is fine; the second has a problem.  I'll be paying closer attention while sewing the blocks as I construct them.  I have some mottled black I was looking at and I decided I don't really like it.  And, I don't like the 2.5" strip.  I'll be using a Kona black that I have on hand and it will be cut at 2".  I may buy backing for this as I don't have very much batik.  Read that -- I have fat quarters only.  With very little going on in May I shouldn't have any problem getting this quilt done. 


I'll be linking up with Red Letter Quilts for the OMG It's Finished Link Up, Can I Get a Whoop, Whoop? and TGIFF!.  Take some time to see what folks have finished this week or month. 

Happy Quilting All!