The Brown Quilt: Finished After Years of Languishing

I can't remember when exactly I started this quilt, but I reckon it's been about six years in the making.  It spent most of that time just sitting in boxes as little pieces of fabric waiting to be pieced together.  I used scraps of fabric from other projects.  Even the backing fabric was pieced together.  I don't know how I ended up with so many brown fabrics, but apparently I was attracted to brown for a period!

 

 

I used a free pattern put out by Art Gallery Fabrics; it is called "Blissful" and was created to go with their line of fabric called "Rapture," both of which I believe were designed by Pat Bravo.  The exact pattern doesn't exist any more on the Art Gallery website, but there are plenty of other simple rectangle designs available.  

 

At some point I misplaced the pattern so I forgot to do the border around the quilt top.  I just edged it with a binding, also hand-made on the bias with fabric scraps.  I didn't do the best job with the binding, to be honest.  I think I just wanted to be done with it!!

 

 

I machine pieced the quilt top and attached the binding by machine as well.  I did the quilting by hand, however.  It had been a long time since I'd done anything with patchwork or quilting, so I wanted to practice the hand quilting.  Plus my little sewing machine certainly wouldn't have been able to handle it.  I went for a simple outline quilting design and I'm happy with the result.

 

 

The finished size is a good size for a lap quilt, or as it's more likely in my case, a cat bed. :)  All in all it was a good project to get me back into quilting.  I've definitely been bitten by the bug and have already started on my next project!