You can tell by the smile on my face how much I love this quilt. It was a no-brainer to choose this beautiful quilt to share on this Blogger's Quilt Festival.
The pattern is from Jennifer Chiaverini's Sylvia's Bridal Sampler book. It consists of 140 blocks - all 6.5". My Quilt Buddy; Mary C, aka: Quiltingrandma and I worked on our separate quilts over 9 months time. I had just had rotator cuff surgery and was recovering. I had picked up Fat Quarters of Nancy Halvorsen's Christmas Fabrics a year or so before and saw them sitting in a bin and knew they were meant for this quilt. I didn't have a Christmas Quilt to put on our King-sized bed. The Background fabric was a problem - everywhere we looked it had sold out. I only had about a yard and a half. I had to get creative, adding another background fabric and using it sparingly. Sewing the blocks was something I could do without hurting my arm. Mary C did the cutting of large pieces. I could sub-cut and trim the Paper pieced blocks as I went along. We would cut blocks and put them in little plastic boxes to take with us on road trips to TRENDS in Portland, OR. We adapted a few of the blocks to make them 3-D blocks, just for fun. The applique blocks were the hardest for me do. E-4 the Indiana Rose block, I made at least 6 times. We even took it to Tri-cities for an Applique class to try and figure out a way to make it. We had our Quilt Tops almost complete when we went to meet Jennifer Chaiverini at her book signing in March of 2010.
I was still searching for the final border fabric, which I found on that road trip. She signed our Quilts in the N-10 Diamond Friendship Block (lower right corner). I consider it her seal of approval. Each Block in the quilt was individually quilted with a feathers wreath. The sashings have Holly quilted in them and the borders a beautiful Feather. It took 11 days to quilt on my APQS Long- arm with Side Saddle. I named it "Cardinals at Elm Creek" because of the cardinals that are fussy-cut and placed in many of the blocks and because Jennifer's books are all about the Elm Creek Quilters. It has been shown in all the local quilt shows now. I'm happy to say that it WON People's Choice at the Trends in Portland last Fall. You can read more about it by clicking on the underlined link.Thank you for looking at my favorite Quilt. You can link up and see over 550 other Blogger's quilts at Amy's Creative Side.
