It was so exciting to have Sinta and Sherri announce the first Schnibble of the Vintage Schnibble pattern for the year. It is Hat Trick! I was so excited but first I had to decide which fabrics to use. I think I decided on two or three different groups when I remembered the first Schnibble from last year. The pattern was ISTH and I chose to use the Urban Cowgirls line of fabric for it. The first lesson I learned is that not every Schnibble pattern works well with different lines of fabric. I love this fabric, but I struggled and struggled with it. I ordered more to try different alternatives, and finally finished ISTH. Consequently, I had lots of leftovers and I've been wanting to use them, so Hat Trick seemed like an ideal choice.
I was limited to my leftovers, as this line of fabric isn't readily available any more. I made my plan and proceeded. I didn't have a lot of the cream/neutral fabric so I added in another cream. I finished the quilt top. I altered the pattern, which used a pieced top and bottom border only, to just frame the quilt center since I had plenty of the gorgeous yellow floral.
It was okay, but I didn't like how the other cream I was using was quite a bit lighter than the cream of the fabric line. It was on my design wall when I went on a shop hop with some friends. We went into the back country of Virginia--I'm not sure just where--and even went to a shop in North Carolina. In that shop, low and behold, she had quite a few bolts of Urban Cowgirl! With binding in mind, I got a quarter of a yard of the cream and yellow plaid. Meanwhile, my parents came and so things were "marinating" in my head for nearly a week. Finally when I got back to my studio, I decided that maybe I could use the cream/yellow plaid for the setting triangles. So I took the borders off, and ripped the quilt apart and used the new setting triangles.
It looked much better! I even got it layered, quilted, and finished the binding this morning! After a wash to get it crinkly, here is the result.
I took the photo outside for better light, but the light was almost too bright and wanted to wash out the fabrics. I love this picture by the azalea bushes, though!
I even pieced the back, trying to use up all the leftovers. You can't tell because of the "washing out" that the skinny light strip towards the center is actually pieced nine patch.
All in all, what should have been a pretty easy project took some rethinking, but I think it came out great in the end. Examples of the finished projects are popping up all over blogland and the results are so different from each other! This is going to be a great parade, so be sure to stop by Sinta and Sherri's blogs tomorrow to catch all of them.
Have a great day!
JoAnne
