Blogger's Quilt Festival

My last couple festival quilts were for nephews.  I haven't had any new nephews, or nieces for that matter, so I had to branch out.  This one was for a brother.  It's not my latest and greatest, but it's pretty stinkin' awesome, says me. 

Behold, the Scrabble Quilt.

way too big for my house! no room to lay flat enough to not be wrinkled

 My brother was going to be turning thirty and I decided he needed something significant to mark the occasion.  He's not married, so I didn't have to factor in a wife's sense of style.  This one is all him.  I've since vicariously decorated for him, but this was the first time I did, I think.



 I am a detail person, so after bringing my Scrabble board fabric shopping and a lot of math I got to it.  I wanted the game area to be the size of the top of his mattress, a CA King.  (Yeah, it's that big.)  I couldn't quite make it to scale.  I decided to have the white sashing finish at 1/2' rather than 5/8.'  The squares finish at 5 inches. 

with my Scrabble board

 The little triangles gave me some trouble.  I had originally planned on piecing them into the sashing.  But with two little kids and then one on the way, the pieced triangles didn't happen.  They are all appliqued on.  By the end I was very much done with the triangles.  I counted them at one point, but I really don't want to know how many it was.  If you wanna do the math, here ya go: the red and dark blue each have twelve and the pink and light blue each have eight.  I zig zag stitched each one onto my quilt top.

I love seeing all the seams on the back of a quilt top

 Once it was assembled, I bust out my gigantoor hoop and got to quilting.  I'm a hand quilter and it wasn't exactly a fast process.  I think it took me a few months to go around every square.  And because of the sashing, it really was around every square, and I had to flare around all those stinkin' triangles.

I was torn on whether or not to include the DOUBLE WORD SCORE type stuff or not.  I decided not.  I went for subtle Scrabble; Scrabbelegance if you will.  I did put the star in the center though, it just needed it, the whole balance of the thing just felt off without it.
It's a CA King size bed quilt, which means it's gigantic.  I couldn't really find a place to take pics of it, there was snow outside, and I was way too excited to wait for my husband to get home to enlist his help.  I didn't take nearly enough pictures.  Someday I'll have to visit it, I mean visit my brother.
I only just this week figured out how I'll someday do the game tiles.  Felt! I had been brainstorming a zillion miniquilts, but then I decided felt is so the way to go.  And it will hide seams on the back piece so I don't have to worry about cheaters.  I decided that when my brother gets married, I'll send them Scrabble tiles. Now I'll just have to come up with some kind of little trays...

quilt measurements:102 x 102 inches
special techniques: applique, hand quilting
quilted by: me! by hand
best category: bed quilt
entry number: 140

be sure to head back to the festival to check out more, but remember to check your watch occasionally, just sayin'...

and for an added bonus, here's the pic my brother sent when I asked him for another for the festival.

See why we vicariously decorate?  Apparently I need to make him a headboard next.  Sigh.  Brothers.