The first Christmas quilt

I've made a lot of Christmas quilts, one just about every year I've been quilting.  But, this was the first one. 

There is a drawback to making a wonderful quilt as the first in a series.  The rest all have to live up to that first one.  And, that's hard. 

My mentor shared the pattern with me.  She had bought it as a kit.  We worked together to pick fabrics from our stashes for my version.  It's fusible web applique and a little bit of piecing. 

It was so much fun to make all the blocks and see them develop.  I think I started this just before Christmas, with a totally unreasonable deadline and ended up finishing it for the next Christmas.  Rookie quilting mistake, right? 

I did all the blanket stitching with the Pfaff 7570 that has since passed away and been replaced with a machine that doesn't have nearly the stitch control that one had.  I miss it. 

The only block I really had trouble with was the nutcracker (above, left).  He was supposed to have pieced black and white teeth.  But they were like a quarter inch wide and I couldn't make it happen...new quilter.  So, I did something different.  Much easier.  If I did that again, I'd have used a white fabric and added the black with a sharpie. 

It has simple ditch and outline quilting that really shows off the applique.  We hang it every year and I'm pretty sure it's everyone's favorite.  I know it's mine. 

I've finished the 1" half triangle square 6 patches and have started sewing them into 12" blocks. 

I needed to make sure all the seam allowances would nest so I laid all my blocks out upside down.  That let me plan how the seams come together and make adjustments to my pressing, which I thought was so well planned when I was making the blocks.  But, half of them had to have seams re-pressed in the other direction.  I almost turned the blocks over, but when I realized that it had to be a mirror turnover, which meant moving blocks as well as turning them over, I decided to just sew them together upside down. 

But, it left me blind to what was happening on the other side.  I decided to wing it anyway.  And, of course...

There are 576 hst in these blocks.  I didn't know there were any two that were identical.  So, what are the chances that two identical squares would end up next to one another?   Rob and Syd both asked if I was going to pick it out.  No, I'm not going to pick it out.  What are the chances that could have happened?  With that kind of luck, I need to buy a lottery ticket. 

The next round of squares measure 2" unfinished.  I don't have any head starts on that.  I've made maybe 50 so far, but they're very similar as the bonus triangles came from just a couple quilts.  I need more variety to start seriously making 16 patch blocks. 

Everybody have a wonderful Friday.  I had my annual evaluation yesterday.  It was full of praise.  It should be.  I wrote it.  But my boss complimented me that it was a really good self-evaluation that described the major things I did over the year and how each thing worked out, both the successes and the less successful.  And, my one big assed embarrassing fail. 

Hey, no need to hide from failure.  Failures are just early versions of successes.  But, for some reason, people think it's brave that I don't mind facing mine. 

Lane