I am surprised to be able to say this, but I have finished another quilt.
In December, I was rather inspired by a comment on the blog from Susan, who put me onto GiveWraps–Australian craft bloggers advocating for the Japanese tradition of wrapping gifts (and everything else, it seems to me) in fabric. The Needle and Spindle versions are patchworked together in a very lovely way that is an excellent fit with what I like to do.
I have been trying to use recycled wrapping paper or making bags for gifts to go in for years… so I was rather inspired by the GiveWraps idea and immediately began patching together yet more bits and pieces. However, ususally I patch leaf prints with other leaf prints, and prints with other prints and plains. The GiveWrap idea somehow had me mixing them up in a rather liberating way.
In this case, I patchworked together leaf print offcuts with leftover pieces of garments that have become bags, scraps of sarong leftover from making pants, details from a pair of shorts that finally came apart and scraps from the previous quilt, as well as stash fabrics.
It went really well, and soon I had two squares the size of the only Japanese wrapping cloth I own. It’s a generous size, almost a metre square. We often use it as a tablecloth on a coffee table. I laid my two squares out on the floor side by side and immediately thought–almost a single quilt there already!
I had plenty of leaf printed fabric to make the back and the binding. This is the back.
Admittedly, machine sewing the binding on became a wrestling match between me and the sewing machine, and in the end the machine had to go into the repair shop. The last little section was sewn on a friend’s machine, and now I have been sadly parted from my machine for weeks.
This time, I actually did make the binding with the wonderfully beautiful slanted seams t5hat create less bulk in the next step.
Partway through hand stitching binding to back, a friend who is a tailor and teaches sewing gave me a tip about sliding my needle along the inside of the folded edge of the binding as I handstitched down the binding, so that went extra well too. Second picture of the binding because… I am proud of actually doing the proper thing with the binding for the first time! So, from this…
To a finished quilt.
I even embroidered a little panel with a dedication and the date, as this is going to be a gift for my fairy goddess-son. A finer appreciator of a handmade item would be hard to find, but he is blessed to be sharing his life with, and being brought up by, two such fine people. Soon it will be his birthday. How to wrap the quilt???
Local & Bespoke 
That is a BEAUTIFUL quilt! I do hope your machine has recovered from its injuries 🙂
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WOW, I would love to see the whole thing as the bits and pieces are such a TEASE!! And I too just found out re the ‘proper’ way to hand sew on a binding and almost lost my mind…queen size Hawaiian batik which is quite FIRM!! Your fabric looks much softer and so lovely. Thanks for showing us.
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You are so kind, Susan! Your batik quite sounds amazing, and I’ve sent you a full photo of the quilt with lots of concrete paving in it too 🙂
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Thanks so much! My machine is still at the shop, but the mechanic sounded confident in the way that people who understand why something is occurring can–I on the other hand just knew I couldn’t fix it, and it could have been irreversible for all I knew. Hopefully, he was right 🙂
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that looks very elegant, I too would love to see the whole thing. and your bound edges are most impressive. I feel for you in your struggles with your misbehaving sewing machine. mine is quite old I think I bought it in the late 90’s, luckily what went wrong in the last few months when I started using it a lot was the foot pedal and I managed to locate a new one on ebay. it is so lovely to be able to speed along with no hesitations and proper control again. yours will be a joy when you get it back.
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Thanks, Jane! I agree… being reunited with a sewing machine that has had some real tender loving care is a joy. Glad you got yours sorted out!
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Lovely quilt and lovely prints, I would like to see the whole piece as well. Love the idea of gift wraps I have been making cloth bags for family gifts for a while which tend to recirculate round the family and then come back to me to re-use.
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Love the way you’ve used all the bits and pieces, the geometry of it.
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Thanks so much!
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It’s a fabulous quilt!
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Thanks, Ruth!
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Your leaf prints on cellulose fibers are great. I have had success using eggs to get bright prints but I’m not getting bright prints with soybean milk. Are you running any workshops in Adelaide that I could attend to get some guidance from you? I have much to learn.
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Thanks so much for your kind comment, Susan! I haven’t got any workshops planned… there are some tips in Eco Colour and there are some from my own experiments here on the Blog. The species of eucalypt makes a difference, and so do the number of soybean milk dips, the cooking time, and the presence of acids like vinegar and metals like iron or copper. I still get plenty of surprises though!
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