Tea Shoppe Quilt

At last the quilt top Mum made is quilted and finished!  All the little tea pots and tea cups have been sewn around and flowers have been carefully stitched so that they are not stitched too much...for I quickly found out that too much detail makes the quilt too flat and hard.

Finished Quilt on my bed

I photographed the quilt this morning with the sun at the perfect angle to show all those little details (so long as you turn off the flash).  Click the link for more detailed pictures!

I have discovered that quilting takes a long time and makes your arms ache.  At first the freehand stitching foot (is that what it's called?) was just impossible for me to use, I kept making a mess.  So I attacked all the easier parts of the quilting first - the straight lines.  I did "stitch-in-the-ditch" for the whole thing, following the original plan that the quilt was never intended to be perfect, which is the only way it was ever going to get done!  So my lines are wonky and go outside the "ditch" all the time.  If this was a dress I would have ground my teeth and unpicked all my mistakes, but it's not..  Here's another picture to keep you interested:

 

You should be able to click on those and make them bigger so you can admire my stitching....ahem.
I never unpicked anything on this, and in places it shows...but only to the trained eye.

     

After the lines were done I decided I would bind it before doing the teapot panels in order to make it as manageable as possible.  My first two corners are horrible, the last two not so bad, the lines are wonky, I found out the back has one or two puckers..but it's done.  Mum was right about that scary busy backing fabric, it hides all the trouble spots!

When I finally got to the teapots I did better with the freehand stitching foot, not perfect, better.  Some places actually look really nice, then I got all excited that I was an awesome stitcher, lost concentration and messed it up... typical.

Teacup cuteness

Too much detail..

Kitty!

More..

with sugar bowl

Pincushion and Spools of thread!

I had thought about adding all kinds of details like colored ties and embroidery.  That didn't happen.  For right now I will enjoy it and move on to another project, I can always add more bling later!  Hope you enjoy the blurry pictures!  :P