You did what to a quilt?

Sometime before Market there always seems to be a collective burst of creative energy from the entire quilt world!  You can see all the building excitement on Facebook, Twitter and especially Instagram!  It strikes just about everyone.  About a week before the event I had an idea.  It was one I had played around with previously but for some reason never fully embraced.

This time, I decided it was a must have! A quilt skirt!

I knew it had to be red and I wanted something fun to make the background dance!  I chose a jelly roll of Zen Chic for Moda Fabrics and various reds from my stash to create the log cabins. I pieced with Aurifil 50wt and constructed the skirt with 40wt.  I used a circle skirt pattern from Butterick B5882 which is a lovely dress but I only needed the skirt and did not want to do the math!

It took only two days to make the completed quilt top!  The log cabins are 12in finished blocks and were super easy to whip together.  I made the center 2.5 x 1.5in and all the rounds are 1.5in strips  Easy peasy! I pressed as I went to keep everything flat.  I did not line the skirt ( no time) and wish that it had pockets ( next time). 

The in-house engineer and the teenaged girl, who typically have NO opinion whatsoever about my quilts both questioned my decision to make this  into a skirt.  They would deliberately stroll through the sewing room and throw a " Are you sure?" in my direction.  The doubt was certainly growing.  The quilt is stunning! 

Katy and I played with the placement for a few hours then went to bed.  The following day, I wanted to make the skirt to have it ready to wear for the Market floor!  I went straight to work!  I cut out the front of the skirt and realized that I had gut it in the WRONG direction!  OMG!  I thought I was going to throw up!  I may have had more than a slight panic attack! My original idea was to have the the direction of the dots horizontal and the links connecting!  This was not cool!

I cut the rest of the pieces out, knowing that there was no way I would have the time to make an entirely new quilt and decided that the Japanese lanterns looked pretty amazing too! 

Honestly, nothing else was done in the house while all of this was happening! The people of the house had to scavenge for food and this was my real sewing space.  This is what we all do for our passion! 

I love this skirt!  There are now more ideas for creative uses with quilt making techniques in garment sewing for upcoming events!