Blogger's Quilt Festival Spring 2013 - Tesseract

If you're visiting from The Blogger's Quilt Festival, welcome to my little corner of quilt-blog land. I started quilting nearly two years ago, and have very quickly become completely obsessed with making quilts. I love participating in the Quilt Festival - it's such a great way to find new-to-me blogs.

This is my entry into the Mini Quilt category. It is called Tesseract, and was made as part of the Emerald Quilt Challenge earlier this year.

Quilt Stats:
Pattern - designed by myself, using Kaleidoscope blocks.
Fabric - Oakshott green shot cottons, and various low volume grey prints
Size - 24" square
Quilted - by me on my Bernina, using Aurifil 50wt in colours 2021 and 2865.

The inspiration for this quilt came from Emerald gemstones, and their multifaceted nature.

I love the depth of colour the Oakshotts give it - the photographs do it no justice at all. It literally shimmers.

I used two layers of bamboo batting when I sandwiched this quilt - I love the extra loft it's given without the puff that comes from polyester batting. I didn't want too much puff on this one, but did want the greens to pop a bit more than they would with a single layer.

Rather than binding it in the traditional fashion, I stitched facing strips to each side and then handstitched them down on the back. Because I used two layers of batting, it was a bit tricky getting it to fold over at the back. Also, my corners are quite rounded :o)

It is pieced and quilted entirely using Aurifil 50wt thread (2021 and 2865) - I love that the quilting blends into the background so well (although it blended so well while quilting I did have a bit of trouble seeing where I was going ;o) ) I really loved doing angular quilting too - a first for me, but definitely not the last. I really want to make a triangle quilt and quilt it like I did the green bits on this one.

I hope you enjoy the rest of the quilt festival!

xx Jess