Midnight Blues, the Flimsy

Midnight Blues is now in the flimsy stage and is hanging in the to be quilted closet until it's turn to be hand quilted.

This looks a lot like an old antique quilt which is where Jayne got the idea.
I knew how I wanted the borders even before I started piecing the blocks. I was going to have a 5" finished cream background border with an appliqued gentle curving vine with lots of leaves in the various blue fabric.

But while quilting the Floral Triangles border, I changed my mind, I decided I was going to make a border like this in Midnight Blues quilted with various blue threads.

So I attached the cream 5" finished border then added the blue side borders. I laid the quilt on the floor to measure before cutting the last two borders, looked at it and thought it looks awful! 

No picture!

I removed the blue borders then trimmed the cream background to 1" finished then added the blue borders, perfect! I like it. Sometimes our plans just don't look right.

Yes, I know, the long sides have selvages. Don't get yourself in a tizzy, they will be cut off before the binding but that won't happen for a long time.

I leave the selvages on so there is more stability in the quilting and also because I don't feel like zigzagging the edge.

Right now the flimsy measures 90" by 97" but of course it will be small after trimming.

My idea for my quilt came from this post on Jayne's blog. She made her blocks finish at 6" while my blocks finish at 4-1/2".

I started making the shoofly blocks when Bonnie Hunter started her shoofly challenge last summer. I didn't use Bonnie's shoofly design, my blocks are made the regular way. 

As I predicted, Bonnie's quilt (actually quilts since she made 2 of them) is bright and colorful while my quilt is not but we're both very happy with our own quilt.

Here's a picture of the waiting to be quilted closet. 

Some of these quilts will be hand quilted, some of the smaller ones will be quilted with my sewing machine. 

Some, like the redwork embroidery in front, are waiting to be sewn into a quilt.

Several years ago, a blogger showed her waiting to be quilted closet, I think she had at least 30 quilts in waiting. She had used metal pants hangers, you know, the kind that things can easily slide off of.

Since I have grandchildren who love to play hide & seek and this closet seems to be the most popular hiding spot, I decided not to go with the metal easy slide off hangers. I purchased my hangers at Target. They are shaped like regular hangers but they're thicker and they are felt coated, no slipping! They come in various colors but I thought white was the way to go.

In case you're wondering why the heifers weren't in the picture of the quilt, I moved over to the right and took this picture. They were grazing behind the quilt! 

Linking to Peacock Party, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished Or Not Friday, UFO Busting