This week’s lesson for the Spoonflower Cheater Quilt is placing the blocks. For a look back, here are the links to the previous lessons:
Lesson 1 & 2 – Link
Lesson 3 – Link
In spite of the poll very clearly going to the border I made from last week’s lesson, the design wasn’t sitting right with me. There was too much room at the top/bottom and it looked funny with the collage blocks added in. Something about the unused space at the top and bottom was unsettling and I didn’t like it. I appreciate the feedback, of course, but, I gave it a week to settle in my brain and I’m really liking the polaroid option (below). Plus, I found a cute camera fabric to work as a backing, so I sampled the blue from the backing fabric image and am using it as my background. I think this creates a more cohesive quilt – the cameras on the backing fabric, the polaroid frames on the front.
That out of the way, Lesson 4 goes on about how to place the collage blocks and order fabric. The fabric we designed for in the tutorials is the Organic Cotton Sateen at $27/yard (ouch). Any other fabric though and the quilt wouldn’t have been long enough, so I get it, but the fabric is pretty expensive. The custom quilt front I designed came with a designer discount, so that was $24.30. The quilt label, also printed on Organic Cotton Sateen, I ordered as a test swatch (8″x8″) for $5, containing 6 labels. The total for the fabric is $59, shipping is another $6, for a grand total of $62.30. It’s not cheap, but for custom organic cotton fabric, I really can’t compalin. I decided it would be easier, this being my first time around sewing a quilt, to use regular quilt binding instead of making my own which would involve ordering another whole yard of fabric. Keep it simple, right?
So, here’s what we have, front and back and the quilt labels (my name is printed on the quilt label, but I’ve removed it here for privacy’s sake)
Pretty excited to get the fabric! I’m running a little behind on the tutorials since I wanted to be sure of my quilt topper design decision. No big deal though – once the fabric is here, I can get sewing right away and it should go pretty quickly!
Sources:
Polaroid Frames – Fuzzimo
Label – From my own stock of family photos/postcards
Quilt Back Fabric – Make it Snappy by pennycandy