Finish, finish, finish, and not finished

Ooh la la! What a couple of days. This evening I am tired but content knowing the African quilt is finished. I quilted all the colored bits and the border, then it was quite done. I am pleased with the result.

Big and beautiful

Some of the African symbols and the other quilting

more symbols...

There are 196 squares, so the symbols are used several times each.

Border quilting

The back is an Indian spread with borders sewn to it.

Here's the border quilting from the back.

I had a second quilt from the same customer, so I decided to get that one done and send them both home tomorrow. This is the second quilt.

Wowsers! I really like this quilt!

The quilt maker carefully placed the colored squares as well as fussy cutting the cornerstones so they have words and little pictures in them.

Panto: Yodel

White on white backing.

As soon as I began quilting the black and white quilt, the phone rang and a customer wanted to know if her quilt was done. She brought it before I went to Wisconsin, and I didn't know she wanted it ASAP. I informed her that I had a very large quilt on the frame and wouldn't be able to get to hers until it was finished. I promised to get hers done by tomorrow afternoon. With my nose to the grindstone, I soldiered on and finished quilt number one and loaded the anxious lady's project. Three and a half hours later, it was also finished. Whew!

The simple pattern really shows off the beautiful fabrics.

Panto: Frolic

A surprise of green on the back

While the APQS rattled along on the two pantograph quilts, I worked steadily on a customer quilt for another quilter on a timeline. The quilt is lovely! All the blocks feature expertly hand embroidered pillow cases made by a relative of the maker. I gather the woman is having her 50th wedding anniversary and the quilt will be a gift for her and her husband. Wonderful! I'm enjoying doing the quilting, and hope to finish the background fill and outer border tomorrow.

After the stitch in the ditch, I quilted the block borders and the yellow striped sashings. The rest of the quilting will occupy the day tomorrow. 

I didn't post yesterday, so I need to take the opportunity to remember our country's day of declaration of independence. We flew our flag and had the all American cook out. There is no other country like ours, and we will all weather the ups and downs of the various administrations and still be proud Americans. I watched fireworks on PBS as well as the New York ones. When you sit in a dark room and watch, its almost like being there...except there are no mosquitoes and crowds of people to fight your way home with when the festivities are over. Grandma fireworks!

See you tomorrow!

Long may it wave!