The Noon and Night Big Reveal

I took the Noon and Night quilt with me to church on Sunday intending to hang it up in the fellowship hall for a picture, but the quilt was too heavy and kept slipping out of the quilt holder. I finally gave up and went to plan B. My friend Frieda and her husband took the quilt up to the balcony of the sanctuary and held it over the railing so I could get a picture:

I had to promise to crop them out, LOL.

In the end, I decided on plain black for the border and binding because I wanted the stars to look like they were floating in the night sky. I am thrilled with the way this turned out. Noon and Night has been a long and fascinating journey but I am glad to be nearing the end.

I worked on the pattern for a couple of hours yesterday morning. The process of creating a quilting pattern is similar to that of creating a knitting pattern, although in some ways, it’s much easier. Sizing up and down is not nearly as complicated. A knitted garment does not get proportionally larger as it increases in size; some parts of the sweater change at a slower rate or even stay the same while other parts increase. Add in a few stitch patterns and the next thing you know, you’re awash in a sea of numbers and letters. I relied on a lot of Excel spreadsheets to size knitted garments.

Measurements for quilt patterns are proportional—at least in a quilt like this—and lend themselves nicely to presentation in neat tables. They do, however, require more schematics and illustrations than knitting patterns. I spend almost as much time in Illustrator now as I do in InDesign.

I am using an EQ8-generated graphic for the cover, which was not my first choice. We got about 8” of snow over the weekend, but the temps are still warm enough that it’s slush, not the fluffy powder that would make a nice backdrop for the quilt. I may stick with the graphic on the cover but include a photo of my quilt somewhere else in the pattern.

Forward progress is progress, no matter what speed, and I am happy with where I am at with this project.

***************************************

I was surfing Pinterest on my tablet before bed the other night and discovered that I have a quilt block named after me. How did I not know this? It is called Janet’s Star:

This appears to be a variation on an Ohio Star block. I am going to play around with this one for sure.

The new quilt top is well on its way to being finished. I might be quilting that one on the Q20 in another week or so, and writing up the pattern shortly after. I have no delusions that this is going to be how fast I churn out designs, but it’s gratifying to know that I can do at least a couple in quick succession.

I have noted, while working on the new top, that my cutting skills have improved dramatically since I first started quilting. Part of that is due to having the Accuquilt cutter, certainly, but part of it is due to experience. I began this quilt using 2-1/2” and 5” squares from my scrap bins, some of which date back to the first few quilts I ever made. I was having to fudge more than expected to get seams and points to match up. This last dozen or so quilt blocks have been cut fresh, from remnants, and they are going together perfectly. The quilt blocks will all be mixed up in the finished top, and once it’s quilted, any discrepancies (and they are minor) won’t be obvious.