I issued a solid fabric only quilt challenge to the Enfield Quilters guild last fall with a due date our 2015 September, tomorrow. The challenge was inspired by solid color quilts I found on Pinterest – there are some amazing traditional and contemporary quilts out there that only use quilt design to make a statement, they have no need for patterned fabric.

My ideas for the challenge were all over the place: I love red and green quilts and thought this was my opportunity so I spent about 6 weeks researching Carolina Lily quilts. This was funny to me since the contemporary photos had been my first inspiration for the challenge. I also found a lot of other red and green quilts to fall in love with but if there’s one skill I haven’t mastered its hand applique, so a lot of those inspirations would have taken me a lifetime to complete.

I settled on a quilt done in a Fibonacci sequence of finished strips of 1”, 2”, 3”, and 5”. A friend of mine and I had a great time at the quilt shop one day, stacking and restacking the solid fabric bolts to reach the final selection.  Then, in order to continue machine quilting for customers, I dedicated 15-20 minutes a night to iron, cut, and sew which was going fine until the last seam.

The last seam has now been sewn three times and is ripped out again – I keep sewing one section in upside down. You would think I couldn’t do this more than once but I assure you, I can and have. Tonight, I’ll hopefully sew the seam for the fourth and final time, right side up, and add the borders. Even when I plan well (I started in July) I still find myself up against the deadline!

Finally, because it is my quilt and I’m not good at putting my quilts in queue, before quilting customer’s quilts, it will sit on a hanger among my many other long arming UFOs. As my Mom always says, “The cobbler’s children have no shoes.” – need another deadline to get it quilted!