Winterville Quilt Finish

Hello Everyone! Have you been having cold and wet weather like we have. I think it’s been pretty much like that everywhere in the country (US). I’ve had my Winterville quilt finished for two weeks, but until two days ago, I haven’t had enough light to get a good picture. I even hauled it with us on our North Carolina trip hoping to find a place to take pictures, which I didn’t. Anyway, here it is, finished one year and four days after I started.

I love this quilt! I had fun making it and following my plan of making each section every month. I love the fabrics and the blue background, and I love the quilting. I didn’t get anyone else to quilt-a-long with me, but that’s okay, I enjoyed the process. Isn’t that what most of us love anyway? The creative process.

I took the pictures in the driveway instead of on the front porch because the lighting was better, but the driveway really was not a pretty background for the quilt. I’ve been trying to learn more about my photo editor (Paint Shop Pro Ultimate), and was able to edit most of the driveway out of the picture.

I really like that I was able to use the light and dark colors with the blue background fabric, which is Shadowplay by Maywood Studio. And the little touch of gold in the corner stars and tree trunks is a nice addition. That fabric is from an older collection of Nancy Halverson’s from Benartex. The rest of the fabrics are:

• Snowflakes and Binding – Sugar Plum Christmas, Bunny Hill Designs, Moda
• Backing – Bonnie and Camille Flannel, Vintage Holiday, Moda
• Vintage Holiday plus other B & C from stash,
  Bonnie and Camille, Moda
• Juniperberry, Basic Grey, Moda
• Fa-La-La-La, Kate Spain, Moda
• Sweetwater Collections, Moda

As you can see, I used a lot of fabrics and most were from my stash, some pretty old. I even had the snowflake and binding fabric. I bought a layer cake of the Vintage Holiday, the blue background and the backing. I used Quilter’s Dream Select batting.

I had the top of the quilt finished by the end of July and it was ready for quilting in October. I kept putting the quilting off because I was quilting my Moda Blockheads 2017 quilt and working on my Holly-Daze quilt, formally known as the Swell quilt, in the fall. I decided to quilt the Holly-Daze first because it is a true Christmas quilt. I purposely didn’t put Christmas fabrics in Winterville.

For those who may not know, I quilt on my domestic Pfaff 4.0 Quilt Expression. Winterville is one of the largest quilts I’ve quilted, finishing at 78″ x 78″. I like to match the Aurifil 50 wt cotton thread with the fabric colors. My quilting is pretty good, but occasionally, there’s a wobble or two. Because I quilted this myself, I was able to custom quilt each area. I like some of the overall quilting patterns, but a quilt like this deserves special quilting in each section.

I started the quilting with the snowflakes, center first then the corner ones. I used a wavy crossing line running through the center of the blocks. This anchored the center and corners of the quilt. Because I had my Westalee ruler foot on, I quilted the houses next. I used the Westalee straight/curved ruler for the straight line quilting and Angela Walters “Squiggy” for the curves in the door.

After finishing all the ruler work, I switched to an open toe free motion foot to make it easier to see my quilting.

I started with the holly leaves and trees, using green Aurifil, then moved onto the stars and berries, using red Aurifil. Finally it was time to quilt the background.

I quilted little snowflakes between the stars. In the center of the stars, I quilted a wishbone pattern and ribbon candy between the rows of holly leaves. When I’m quilting something this big, I need to switch the quilting up just so I don’t get bored with it.

I will admit, quilting those background swirls became a little tedious. I also had to concentrate to keep them a little bigger than I normally quilt them in my mini quilts. There were a couple of times that I thought I should learn to quilt on a long arm machine and rent one when I needed it. I quilted everything from top to bottom, then turned the quilt and did the next leg of the square. This kept too much of the quilt from being on the right side of the needle.

Winterville is by Camille Roskelly of Thimble Blossoms. If you want to make your own Winterville, you can find the pattern here.

I made this quilt to be used and loved, not just to hang around on the banister or wall, although it would look good on either one. It’s going to be a great quilt to cuddle up with on cold winter nights! And if you’re wondering why I spent all that time quilting it when it’s going to be a cuddle quilt; well I enjoy the process of quilting and I’m quilt worthy!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you like this quilt as much as I do.