I finished!

My goal for the day was to finish my version of Roll Roll Cotton Boll, the latest mystery quilt from quiltville.com --and I did!  Since I live in Hawaii, and people like to visit Hawaii in the winter, I had company or was traveling myself for the holidays, from mid November (when the mystery started) until the second week of February, I wasn't able to work on the mystery with everyone else.  That was okay, since I wanted to change the pink/green/brown colorway to my preferred, er, patriotic scheme.  Bonnie warned that if you wanted to make a change, you must have 5 colors, so the typical red, white, blue wouldn't work.  I did red, medium blue, navy blue, neutral, and gold.  I was working away, enjoying myself until I had only 6 of the pieced blocks and most of the string blocks left.  I had laid out a corner of how the quilt would work and for some reason I lost my motivation.  I picked  it up and put the pieces in a bag and worked on postcards for two weeks. 

I don't like to leave things unfinished, though, so I got it back out and started working.  It took two days, and at first, it was a bit tedious again, but pretty soon I got going. Yesterday was the day to finish!   In the morning, I was able to get all the blocks together with no mistakes!  Whoo hoo!  I usually always turn something wonky when I'm setting blocks on point.  After lunch, it was on to borders.  I had already pieced the outer borders, but needed to cut strips for the inner border. 

Well, that should have been easy, and was, until I had sewn one on to the first side and discovered that the second side strip wasn't quite right.  I thought I could cut another one and use that wrong one for the top or bottom, but then realized I didn't have enough strips and I didn't have any more of that fabric!  Stymied!  Would I have to go out to a shop and try to find something?  Order something?  Not be able to finish?  I gave my stash a half-hearted seach, not expecting to find anything but unearthed a Thimbleberries gold I forgot I had!  Yes!  I started over with the strips.  I think I lost an hour, but pushed on. 

I had the inner border on and then needed to fiddle with things.  Bonnie said that the inner border may have to be adjusted in order to get the pieced border to fit--it all depends on seam allowances and accuracy, etc.  Isn't trying to match a quilt to a border much more difficult than fitting a border to a quilt?!  It is for me, plus it was more difficult with a diagonally pieced border.  At any rate, I got it to work, sewed on the first 2 and then it was time for supper.  We went to my favorite Mongolian BBQ--it is on an open lanai next to the channel for Pearl Harbor--just gorgeous.  Afterwards, I got the other 2 strips sewn on, added the corners, and was done!

DH took me out to eat for supper and even my fortune wanted me to finish this quilt today!

Here is the finished, queen-sized quilt top!

A closeup to see my color choices a bit better

What will I do today?  Probably tidy things up again and then, who knows?!  I have a few possible USOs (Un Started Objects) to choose from. 

Aloha,

JoAnne