Project Quilting Season 8 -- Challenge 5

When I read the fifth challenge for Project Quilting Season 8 on Sunday evening, I thought -- "what?" -- "a well-dressed man"?  No way!!

 

But Monday morning as I was waking up, there it was -- Doug's Market ties!

My husband was the marketing director for Paisley Farms (a local specialty food processor). 

He loved that job -- got to talk to people all day long about his favorite thing -- food!!

RJR had just introduced their first collection of veggie prints.

So I made him an assortment of ties to wear at trade shows -- proved to be quite a conversation opener!!

 

Now I don't have time this week to work on a "from scratch" project (prepping for my annual student retreat in Amish country) but I've been spurred into taking it along to the retreat to finish.

Just needs quilted and it's only about 30" square!

But after looking it at all day on Tuesday, I decided the borders need reworked.

Something was wrong and the whole quilt buckled.

At first it seemed like taking off the last two border strips I had added would enable me to straighten everything up and put the borders back on. 

Ummm, nope! 

Look how out of whack this is!?! 

In the end and in the interest of maintaining momentum (it's already been waiting in the "to be quilted" queue for about 20 years), once I took off the other two border strips, I decided to eliminate the green border completely. 

I'll bind it in green!

So it's layered and packed for a quick finish this weekend!!

Going to keep it simple with a crosshatch grid and my walking foot.

Watch for it's progress on Instagram (I'm @hueymary)!!

I hope you get to do lots of stitching this weekend, too!!

 

Mary

 

Monday, March 6

Here is the finished quilt.  As often is the case, I'm finding myself wondering why it took so long to finish it -- 20 years?!?  My plan is to hang it in my studio (once I get the casing added) and enjoy the happy memories it evokes of my husband and his cheerful attitude.