Sorrento Quilt {Blogger's Quilt Festival}

My second entry for

A hand appliqued quilt.

This quilt was for my husband's parents this past Christmas.  They are world travelers and the pattern I found in one of my older American Quilt and Patchwork Magazine issues seemed to fit the traditional European look.

I chose the really bright yellows/golds, greens and reds because they have decorated their home with those colors.  It actually reminded me of Sorrento, Italy and the amazing textiles you see there. Even the buildings are painted in bright colors!

Hubby and I had taken a Med Sea Cruise about 10 years ago and it was one of our stops.  Ironically, they had visited it on a long bus tour of Italy that same year and had raved about the town. 

I started with the center medallion.  However, ithe original pattern dimension was too small for a nice throw.
It was at that point, I turned it "on point" and added a second inner border and large yellow triangles.  Just that small change made the quilt transform from 40" square to 70" square!

As you can see, I used the original leaves and dots for the outer border, but decided to play with them more to fill in the yawning negative space.   I included vines to extend the look. Otherwise, they looked like sad little leaves.

The one thing that was new for me was that I decided to use the pattern's technique for the applique.  I usually do needle-turn applique or machine stitch applique and then add embroidery. However, the pattern designer encouraged quilters to use the embroidery floss to not only enhance but stitch it straight to the background.

I have to admit, it made it faster, but I felt like it had more of a folk art feel to it, which was interesting.  I am not sure I will do it this way again. 

I did have fun with the quilting.  Swirls in the dots, vine and squigglies in the leaves.

Meandering in the outer border, s-curves in inner borders, swirls.  You name it.  We won't mention to them that I was literally quilting it, right up until 10 minutes before they pulled in the driveway. Just in time to unpin it off the longarm rails!

The medallion part was my favorite.  I echoed around the flowers and vines.  And then in the triangles around the medallion, I did a fun free emotion peony-like flower. 

I decided to go with the check binding to reflect the inner borders.  I snuck in bindig stitching late in the night after they headed to the hotel. 

I'm not thrilled with the backing. I had really wanted to have one solid color for them because they are traditional. It was this moment that I realized that I have been doing a great job of using stash only and just do not have significant yardage to do complete backings!

I did have fun with the label.  I really am digging embroidered labels.  The label went on Christmas Eve.  Wrapped and under the tree for Christmas morning.  

However, I did warn them when they opened that I knew I had to do a few snips here and there and wash it...I was in urgent care with Button for the flu Christmas Eve evening!

Quilt Stats

Measures: 70" square
Pattern: A Fresh New Attitude from AP&Q magazine.  

Fabrics:  Stash buster.

Quilting: myself on Avante 18 longarm 

I sure hope they don't just lay it on the back of a chair...it definitely is a good size to cuddle under!

Now I just want to make it in more modern colors for myself.

If you stopped by from the festival...Hiiiiiiii!!!!  I'm off to go visit the other entries!!!

P.S.  My other entry for the festival is a more modern ROYGBIV quilt HERE.