...finally finished - A bee Quilt

I have been, at different times in four different bees. One of them is the do. Good Stitches bee and has very clear guidelines in the due dates to finish quilts for which you have been responsible for the design so have finished the three quilts I have been responsible for in that one. 

That leave three bees for me and until earlier this week the total of finished quilts I had for them was zero. To be fair two were in the late quilting stages but had languished in that phase for ages and had been in various stages of construction for nigh on two years. The other is a spring chicken at only about a year old but still at exactly the same form as when the blacks arrived back in my mailbox. 

But thanks in part to the Olympics and the cold nights I have finished off the hand quilting on this one. And in a rare display of some good solid forward planning and because of the placement of the machine quilting I could hand stitch down the binding right away instead of waiting for the interest in getting it done to outweigh the laziness of needing to change to the walking foot because I attached the binding at the time of the machine quilting.

The blocks were completed by the lovely ladies of the Bee Seam Piecing Downunder bee with a theme of 'Circles'. I also asked that each sign a siggy block that I later embroidered and pieced into the back with a couple of blocks that didn't make it back in time to be sewn into the front. 

The sashing and borders took a few different forms before this final version - 2" finished sashing in Kona Coal and scrap 2" finished squares for the border. 

The backing in this Aqua print from Spotlight (with the extra blocks, siggy blocks and some sashing) and the binding in yet more scraps from the feature fabrics. 

Machine quilting in the sashing was with some 12wt Aurifil 1/4" inside each seam and then the border squares each had an X quilted inside with a 40wt Aurifil. An echo or feature circle was hand quilted inside each of the block in DMC Perle 8 in a light grey.

Finishing at about 58" by 71" this one is a little wider and shorter than average but great for the couch at night. 

Thanks to Pam, Bec, Emma, Erin, Kelly, Kelly, Rose, Sue, Liz, Nicole and Abby for the blocks and for a wonderful year of patchwork and an another year of quilting!