Finished: Pearl Bracelets Marine Den Quilt

Taadaa! This lovely quilt is my fourth Marine Den, and it was so much fun to work with colors that I would have never thought to use. Yay, yay, yay, for other folks who have the gift for picking fabric, because it's definitely always a challenge for me even when I'm just picking for myself.

I did a large meandering stipple for the background. I did still end up stitching in the ditch all around the pods, since I chickened out on FMQing the pod solids. Rather, I did do some FMQ in the pod middles. For some reason that actually seemed to be a faster approach than stitching in the ditch around the pod middles.

I think that's because stitching in the ditch is so tedious and precise; plus you have to turn the quilt each time you complete another side of a rectangle. Hours of fun.

Call me crazy, but I feel like the meandering stipple pattern gives a lot of elasticity to the finished quilt. If I pull on it in any direction, it has a bit of give to it. Then it snaps back, that's completely unlike the January do. Good Stitches quilt that has all different kinds of quilting patterns covering it. Has anyone else noticed this?

I had a bunch of spools of blue Coats & Clark thread from making curtains in 2007. Magically, the color was a perfect match for the background and backing fabric, so I used up two spools in this quilt. I used it to stitch in the ditch as well. I was able to use it in the bobbin on some of the FMQ in the pod middles, but I found that other stitches were more inclined to pull the bobbin thread up to the top. I was in no mood to experiment with threads and tension, so I used coordinating top and bobbin threads on some of the pod middles. It in no way bothers me to have spots of yellow thread on the quilt back. My inner child thinks it's fun, like a game of I-Spy, so my grown-up sewist side likes it, too.

Quilty Stats:
Pre-wash dimensions: I definitely wrote these down on one of the pieces of paper piled up around here.
Post-wash dimensions: 56"x37"
Batting: Warm & White from The Warm Company
Front Fabric: Michael Miller Cotton Couture solid in Wedgewood, Kona Cotton Blue, Ash, Ivory, and Celery, a gray "wood floors" print, Pearl Bracelets in Citron, River Bend, and Sandbox.
Back Fabric: Pearl Bracelets in River Bend
Binding Fabric: Kona Cotton in Celery
Quilting: Free Motion and Stitching in the Ditch with the Janome Horizon 8900 QCP.

Happy Crafting!

Claire