Love in Polaroids

It's finished!  A great big thanks to the Love circle for joining with me to make polaroid blocks this May.  I adored the finished blocks (20 in all) with anywhere from 4 to 9 cute little polaroids each.

One day I photographed the pile of them and was instantly inspired to try for a random "tossed" design.  I knew it would mean picking apart some of the blocks and wasn't sure how I felt about doing that.  But in the end, the tossed arrangement was just so much more interesting than sewing the blocks together end to end, so I timidly wielded the seam ripper and carefully, carefully took apart about a third of the blocks.  (Mainly, I deconstructed the 9-polaroid blocks into smaller groups of 6 or 3 or 2 or 1.) Not a polaroid was wasted!

Once I started working at it, the quilt top came together in about a day.  Though, to be fair, I was working without a design wall (on my floor) which I knew I couldn't share with the family (and cats) for long - so I was super motivated to finish!  I brought in Kona Coal and Kona Medium Gray to fill the spaces.

For the back, I began with a large cut of Remix Argyle from Robert Kaufman.  I love this bright, happy print with so many pretty colors!  In hopes of keeping things gender neutral, I added that large darker blue Happy Drawing Giraffe's print.  It's a vibrant blue and cheerful orange, so in keeping with bright, bright, bright.  And then some smaller cuts of Modern Whimsy (the aqua Bunny Rabbit Trellis and Vines in Park) finished it off.

This quilt is full of characters front and back!  I think it's going to be so fun for a child to discover.  In fact, I know it is cause Aria and Liam both initiated spontaneous eye-spy games during the making!  All those polaroids are mesmerizing and they're going every-which-way too, so there's not a top or bottom to this quilt.

And the quilting?  Well, I can't say that went too well.  I wanted to do boxy lines that turn randomly, sometimes making a boxy spiral.  Is that a good idea on a very big, over-sized throw?  Why no, it is not.  Thanks to the generous harp space in my Pfaff Smarter, I was able to do a pattern like this using my walking foot and turning the quilt often, but it was definitely not enjoyable. I think my basting job was lacking as well, so there were puckers sometimes.  Disappointing and a lesson learned, but at the same time I tried not to let it get to me so much. This quilt is a gift to some needy child through Wrap them in Love.  I'm sure he or she will be having too much fun looking and touching and appreciating to tut-tut the occasional pucker.

Love in Polaroids is bound with the Loulouthi Stockings stripe that I've been saving all this time.  I love it as a binding!  It's gray and bright.  Perfect. 

I'll be shipping it out tomorrow with all our love.