BLUEBERRY HILL--The Quilting

 While looking for an idea for a quilt to make as a gift, I came across a quilt on Instagram that was perfect. Thimbles and Needles is an Australian company and she calls this quilt Blueberry Kisses. The pattern is available as a PDF download.

69" square

As usual, I made a change to the pattern--instead of half blocks in the perimeter triangles, I used a variety of dark blue fabrics. Visually, this provides a border and I saw no need to add any additional borders.

This was fast to make and fun to quilt. Here is how I did the quilting.

First, just a reminder, you may want to pre-wash fabrics when there is lots of dye--those dark blues can really run. One lighter blue got in with the whites and there was enough color in that Color Catcher to make me very glad I used it:

I LOVE ruler work, quilting with Templates, also called Rulers. There are my favorites and I use them with almost every quilt. The Line Tamer makes it a breeze to stitch in the ditch. Amanda Murphy's ruler sets are well-made and work very well--this is one of the circles. The Grip-Its are what work BEST for me for free-motion quilting--I have tried every other solution, gloves, rubber finger tips, big gripper rings, etc. The Grip-Its are so easy to use--you just rest your hands on them, the rubber bumps on the bottom make the quilt slide easily as you have fun playing with free-motion designs: 

Threads are an important part of the quilting plan. I am a fan of Superior Threads; these are the four I used on this quilt. The bobbin has Bottom Line, my usual choice for bobbin thread. The back is dark blue so the bobbin thread is too. Microquilter is a fine. strong thread, 100 wt, and I use it for stitch-in-the ditch work. I used a medium-dark blue for that. For the ruler work, I used Omni-V, a 40 wt thread that was slightly variegated with medium to dark blues--it worked very well for the designs made with rulers. Then I used So Fine, a 50 wt, 3 ply, in a light color for the free-motion done on the white/cream fabrics:

The ruler work with the dark blue Omni V thread: 

Curved Cross-Hatching is one of my most favorite designs, though it is hard to see on printed fabrics: 

The simple loop-de-loop free motion design on the light fabrics went very quickly. It was just enough to secure the sashing, and left about the same amount of open space as the ruler work designs:

I always include a hanging sleeve on the back of every quilt I make, regardless of size. Here you can see how the top edge of the sleeve is covered by the binding. I only have to hand sew the bottom edge. Be sure to lengthen the stitches when sewing on the binding--here I was sewing through 7 layers: 

I do enjoy the binding process, often done by hand.  A few Wonder Clips make it easy to stitch around the binding: 

Later this year I will give this quilt to a special person. The good news is, I am teaching this quilt as a one day class, Tuesday October 11, 2022, 10-3:30, at Southern Charm Quilting here in Huntsville. This is the only time this quilt will be offered since I won't own the quilt after that. 

Two color quilts are very striking and any two colors will work. School colors would be fun, as would red, white and blue, or red, green and white--3 colors work as well.

This entire quilt is made using 2.5" strips, except for the border triangles. Learn lots of great tricks to speed up the piecing process. And how to replace half blocks with triangles. I hope to see you there.

Let's quilt.

Barbara