Scrappy Squares

More than a month has gone by since I have shared anything here.  I have been busy at the longarm, just not busy at the computer so I have lots of wonderful things to share!  First up is the quilt I finished and gave to my Mother-in-law for Christmas.  I have been wanting to give my in-laws quilts for awhile and I decided this was the year I was going to make it happen!  My father in law received the Traction quilt that graces the cover of the pattern that you can see here.

I knew I wanted to add custom quilting to this Scrappy Squares top.  The squares came from an exchange I participated in during my time in Flin Flon with the North Star Quilters Guild.  I completed the top quite awhile ago but it waited for the right occasion to make it to the top of the quilting pile. 

My mother-in-law is a fabulours garderner, so adding a floral design to the open squares was an easy decision.  I added a branching curl design to fill in the rest of the background space.

All of the dark squares and triangles received a simple continuous curve design.

And I love adding feathers to borders, and this one was the perfect size for some flowing feathers.

Before sending this quilt off I decided I would put it through the wash, just in case a few of those squares from the exchange were bleeders.  I soaked this quilt in hot water following Vicki's "Save My Bleeding Quilt" method using blue Dawn and my bathtub.  I'm very glad I did, there was either a lot of excess dye, or some grunge from the batik fabric production process, but it warranted two tubs of water.  Now I know it can successfully be washed whenever it is needed with no worries. Washed quilts are also so much cuddlier than one fresh off the longarm!