Quilt #4

I usually only have a max of two quilts going at once.  I have one in the piecing stage and one in the quilting stage.  After that, things get complicated.  I do not like UFOs and am fortunate to say I only ever left one project get like that.  I made my son a snake quilt and left it sit for about a year before quilting it.  Here it is.  This is the second quilt I made.

Anyway.  This time around, I let myself get up to four projects at once.  You have seen the other three and they are nearing completion or have already been finished (Crumb Patch, the Evelyn Sloppy string quilt, the GFG, and the one I am about to share with you).

I wanted to make a gift for my sister.  My thoughts were twofold.  Fall colors and tree of life.  She had fallen in love with an Amish quilt but could not remember the pattern.  WE looked at hundreds of Amish quilts but none rung a bell in her memory.  After lots of thought, I decided to not even try to make an Amish style tree of life type of quilt.  I didn't want it not to meet what picture she had in her mind, get what I mean?  So, I went totally different.  I saw this artist named Natasha Wescoat.  She makes beautiful paintings of trees of life.  they are whimsical, colorful, and downright spectacular.  I wanted to make a quilt inspired by her beautiful paints.  This is what I came up with.

And this is the way it sat for about two months while I finished other projects.  At 43 x 66 the measurements were not wide enough in my opinion.  I wanted a lap quilt and after borders it would have ended up too long and too skinny.  My LQS ran out of the fabric and I could not find it online.  Finally, it hit me.  I decided to do a triple border of brown, gold, and brown, then finish it off with a fourth braided border.  The final braided border would be fall colors to pull out the bright batiks used in the center.  It would end up twin sized.  I have worked the last few days and have gotten this far.

I have just started working on cutting pieces for the braided border.  More to come!

On a side note, I will mention that I put the string quilt away for a bit.  The top and back done, but I have no batting.  I will be picking some up after vacation in Mid July and hope to have it done not too long after that!