Looking for the heart

I was following a 'blog trail' starting from Wonkyworld to Black Threads a few weeks ago where I came across this book  'Stitchin' and pullin': A Gee's Bend Quilt'. I was struck by these words;

"Look for the heart....when you find the heart your work will leap to life...."

I started piecing together fabrics randomly from my 'use-it-up' box (fittingly the heart fabric was chosen by a friend of my daughter, for a dress last summer, and the quilt is going to her soon-to-be-born sister). 

I randomly machine pieced the fabrics together and once I had a block I placed it on an upterned crib quilt that I already had, for idea of size. I like to think that quilters would have once worked like this, back before rotary cutters, printed patterns and design boards.

Once I had four blocks, I cut strips of the sashing fabric with large dressmakers shears. This was all done by eye - I was surprised at how accurate you can be, with a decent pair of scissors.  There was just enough sashing fabric - the top and bottom borders are pieced - with practically no fabric left over. This quilt just seemed meant to be. The whole quilt went together in about four days - if you have been following this blog then you know that is a real departure for me.

The back is pieced - I didn't have anything large enough - and these were scraps I wanted to use up. The top and back were done in a few hours. I was so enjoying seeing a quilt go together so quickly that I pin basted with safety pins, and quilted freehand lines without a hoop, using perlé 5 thread (no reason - it is just what I had).

I have never done a pieced binding before but I am really happy with how it turned out.

I thought it was fun to photograph these two quilts together. One neat and one free. Next I would like to do something in between.