The snowball is washed and de-linted and tagged and boxed and wrapped. I went to my Grandmother today.

She called it a "show piece", and "perfect" (!!!), and I believe "masterpiece" worked its way in there too. She spent some time looking for a big stitch and informed me that she couldn't find one (perhaps she did not look too hard, for I know there are a few where there are some bulky seams).

And then she got out her ruler and found a straight patch so she could measure my stitches, and pronounced 16 stitches per inch on the quilting in the center of the snowballs.

Yes, that *is* a lot. It's probably an upper limit, not an average, since the block outlines will be considerably less where I had to sew over seams. And she seemed very pleased with the evenness of the stitches, though I think I can do better.

However, after that I almost don't want to give it away. It *is* the nicest quilt I've ever made.

Okay, now on to the next one!

The binding is done! Four steps left...

1. Give the quilt a thorough lint brushing.
2. Wash the quilt to remove the blue quilt line markings.
3. Add the quilt tag to the back.
4. A final pass with the lint brush, before the quilt is wrapped.

Excluding all the admiring and photographing, of course.

This quilt is all over nubblies and I've figured out why -- I tried a new cotton batting this time around. I was blaming the cats for all the fuzzies, but it wasn't them. It's the darn batting that shed everywhere. I've *never* had a batting do this, and I will *never* use this type again. I usually use Quilter's Dream Cotton and it really lives up to its name -- I'll be going back to that for the next quilt.

And now I have to decide whether to continue on the double pinwheel, or sit back with the crochet hook and work on some bunnies....

Okay, I would like your input on this. Take a glance at this picture of the snowball quilt top and tell me, your overall impression, what colour is most prominent?

ie. If you were to say that "The colour there is most of is {x}", what colour would {x} be?

Update: Since some of you asked -- I mean exclusive of the white snowballs. I'm trying to figure out something about colour balancing in the patchwork.

( Photo behind the cut )

It's okay if the answer is that nothing jumps out at you as being "most".

I have another idea for a quilt.

*headdesk*

The binding is made. I'm about to go sit down with the quilt and start sewing it on. I have a rant in my head about the instructions for making bias binding that are in one of my quilt books, but it won't make any sense if you've never made bias binding, so I shall spare you. They're good instructions, but they miss a step. That made the process take longer than it should have.

I don't know if I'll get the double pinwheel together by tomorrow night. It's been a busy week and I might decide to take the evening off and relax instead.

I want to spend the weekend making crochet bunnies.

Quilting done.

*collapses*

I'm sure it looks gorgeous, but I've lost all sense of distance. At 15 1/2 blocks I felt like it was all downhill from there and it would be no problem to finish. at 16 1/2 blocks I started going on sheer determination, rather than momentum.

And it's done. And my fingers are sore. And I'm really tired.

I'll gloat properly tomorrow. G'night.

This morning, while sitting and quilting, I plotted out my next two quilts, not just one.

Of course, the way these things work, there's no guarantee that the two quilts in my head will be the next two I make. But the possibilities are very interesting.

Incidentally, just a reminder that if you'd like to see all of the quilting posts, most of them are locked due to their gifty nature. If you'd like to see what I'm working on, drop me a note and I'll friend you so you can see everything (unless it's for you).

It's not as far as I wanted to get this weekend, and I have a bunch of stuff going on this week that will probably prevent me from matching last week's pace, but there's still plenty of time before Christmas, so I'm not worried.

The goal this week will be to keep at it and finish at least one block. If I could take a day off - a whole day where I didn't have anything else planned - I would likely finish the fershluggener thing in one go. As it stands, I'm still in the so-close-yet-so-far-away stage where I want it to be done, but it just doesn't seem to be getting there.

Next week.

I have 5 snowballs left to quilt. FIVE.

The quilt is mocking me. It will take as long to do those snowballs as it did to do any other five (and that's somewhere in the neighbourhood of 7 hours, if I'm calculating right), but it's enough to make my brain say "Almost done!" And then I finish another one, and it isn't done. And another, and it isn't done.

Five is just enough to seem not very many and at the same time seem insurmountable. And the whole time the quilt just sits there in its unfinished state. Looking forlorn ("Oh, won't you please finish me?". Or smug ("You'll never finish me! Neener, neener!).

Uppity thing. I have a good mind to go quilt it just to show it who's boss!

Average 1/2 of a snowball block quilted every night this week, for a total of 2 1/2 snowball blocks finished by the end of the week.

Current total: 1/2 block done. But I haven't started quilting this evening...

Update, Wednesday Morning: HA! Sewed almost a whole block last night to bring the total up to 1 1/2 blocks done since Monday. That means I'm at 11 1/2 blocks complete. Go me.

That puts me at double digits, and means I hit my goal for the weekend.

Of course, my brain gets ahead of me, and it wanted 4 blocks done on the weekend, which would have put me at 12. MUCH closer to the finish line. I always have "secret" goals like this, where my brain says "And then you can do four more!" The bit where that would mean not eating or sleeping for the entire weekend seems not to occur to that part of my brain.

Quilting also takes quite a toll on my fingers, so I have a nice callous forming on the index finger of my left hand (the hand that the needle hits on its way through the fabric). Had I done more this weekend, I think it would have been very, very sore.

I'm still enjoying the quilting a lot (except for the brief period on Saturday where I had to re-trace one of the designs because it looked like it was originally traced by a drunk monkey -- it's fixed now), and yet I also wish there were less left to do.

I have a feeling that as soon as I finish the quilt I'm going to zoom around on the binding like nobody's business, finishing it in a day or two.

As near as I can figure, I'm still on track for finishing this for Christmas.

And as that puts me at the halfway mark for the snowball quilting, I've decided to upload some photos. These were taken back at Thanksgiving, so you'll see that there are only four snowballs finished. But you can see what the detail looks like on both the front and back, and what one of the blocks looks like when it has the design traced on but not quilted.

( Photos behind the cut. Warning: BIG. )

It progresses, though I'd hoped to do more in the evenings this week, it hasn't happened. Oh well.

My goal for this weekend is to finish at least two more of the snowballs. That's what I managed last weekend, so we'll see.

I'm enjoying the quilting but I sort of feel like I'm quilting and quilting and quilting and not getting anywhere -- and then I remember that 2 weeks ago I only had 4 of the snowballs finished, and I feel a bit better.

Well, I was hoping to make a triumphant announcement on Sunday night/Monday morning to the effect that I was half done (or more) the quilting in the snowball blocks. In my calculations, being up to block 11 would not have been unreassonable.

The weekend had other plans, unfortunately, including the worst migraine I've had in a long while, resulting in me losing most of Saturday to sleeping, and then Sunday erand running took most of the day.

On the upside, I am now working on the 8th snowball, and loving every minute of it. I love watching the pattern come together - how the pattern I've drawn on the fabric gets that slightly puffed, slightly crinkly look as I quilt it, how the level of detail is really making the quilt pop when I step back to look at it. I'm stepping back after every block or two to give the quilt lots more love and admiration. I find myself wanting to take just a few stitches more, just a few stitches more, because I don't want to put the quilt down, and that's a fantastic place to be.

This quilt is being gifted at Christmas. I'm determined, now. I've extended this deadline too many times.

Finished quilting another one of the snowballs this morning. Then had a few minutes of panic as I couldn't find the stencil to mark the next snowball. I did find it though, so work on that should continue tonight.

Only 12 left to go...if I think about that too much I get a little nuts. I've changed my idea of when this quilt will be finished so many times. I REALLY want it done in time to gift for Christmas.

I have other quilts to work on. It's not that I dislike this quilt -- in fact, I love the design and the quilting -- I'm just a little tired of working on it and want it to be done.

And ye spirits of piecing and cutting...

I would like to know where my fabric scissors are. I know they must be around here somewhere, but I don't know what drawer, what fabric box, what dusty corner, they have chosen to languish in.

If you could let me know, that would be great.

What was I thinking when I said I was going to quilt this within an inch of its life?

What was I thinking when I made the quilt this big?

Still and all, it looks AWESOME. I finished outlining all of the blocks with stitching, and now I'm putting my chosen design in each of the snowball blocks. I'm hoping this will finally be ready to be gifted at Christmas. (And about darn time too, since I started the darn thing in late March, finished the top in late April, and have been quilting ever since.)

Okay. Take this apple core quilt. Apple cores are traditionally just a mishmash of different colours combined, but this one uses "squares" of four pieces of a like colour to good effect.

Now, in your mind's eye, take that idea and turn it into a stash patchwork, like the snowball-and-ninepatch I'm working on. So you'd have a block of four red, four green, four dark brown, four creamy colours, four yellow, kinda randomly around the quilt. OR. Say, a border of red, an inner ring of blue, and inner ring of green, yellow in the center, or something.

Yep. Totally making it.

Not right now of course. Gah. Do you think I don't have enough to do?

But yes. It's an attractive idea.

*crossposted from my blog*

I forgot to mention. On the weekend I went over to see Karine's new house. We got the grand tour, including a stop in Samuel's room, where she has the boat quilt I made prominently on display. She's bought clips for it and made it a wall hanging/focal point at the end of the room.

I'm quite bowled over by it on two levels. One of which is that the gift is very obviously appreciated and loved. Two is that, damn, did I ever do a lot of quilting on that thing. And it looks pretty darn good!

I haven't been working on this one much because it's summer and it's hard to sit under a quilt when it's warm outside. Two weekends ago I sat down and got a decent amount done, but there's a LOT left to quilt still, even before I get to the part where I have to quilt inside the snowball parts.

I love the quilt, though. It's now sitting in my back bedroom, and every time I walk in I admire how it's going so far. I also want to sit down with it, but the weather and the temperature inside the apartment just hasn't allowed for it. We had a few cool nights recently but no cross-breeze, so while it was cool enough outside, the living room and bedroom were still too warm to justify sitting under a blanket. I might have finally managed tonight, but the weather is now humid again and not as cool. Such is summer in Montreal, but it's frustrating because I really do want to be working on this project and I can't. Plus I want to have it finished and delivered during my trip to Halifax in September, and that becomes less and less likely with each passing heat wave.

Rgh.