Two Peas In A Pod

Two fast and fun finishes: meet Pod One and Pod Two. Don't ask me which is which. These are both the 36"x48" small wheelchair size that I've been making lately. They go together so quickly at this size, especially when the blocks are already sewn.

Back in March, I pieced 32 of these leaf shapes out of a jelly roll of autumnal fabrics. I really like the colors and shape, but just couldn't make a layout that worked well. With big, 12" blocks, it didn't make sense to sew up a large flimsy that I didn't really care for, so I set the blocks aside.

However, when I limited myself to the much smaller three by four block layout, I was able to get the leafy shapes to play nicely across the quilt. Each row "leans" in the same direction and feels a bit more orderly.  The colors aren't true in these photos; the main fabrics are quite bright, and the background is a much warmer, nicer tan faux burlap design.

On the first one, I tried my hand at big, loose feathers in each block. Then I did a bit of echoing in the sashing. I guess this one must be Pod One. I tried several styles of feathers, some more successful than others. They were fun, but almost completely lost on the busy fabrics. I guess that's a good way to hide the wonky feathers while I practice. (Note that I think of these shapes as leaves, but DH Sean kept calling them pods, and the name stuck. Leaves don't have feathers, anyway, but feathery pods might?)

Rather than lose more quilting into the visual chaos, I chose to do simple curvy cross hatching on Pod Two. This was very fast and easy, taking less than two hours on my domestic machine using my new walking foot with the spacer bar. The spacing is 1.75".

Here are the two different bindings: a groovy, psychedelic 70s paisley in exactly the right colors, and a small, dark green diagonal stripe in more traditional fabric. The stripe is printed diagonally; that's not bias binding. I'm way too lazy for bias binding unless there are actual curves to bind around. 

Here are the backs. These fabrics are just about as dull as they appear in the oddly lit photo: a brownish grey cable print on the left, and dark green flowers on tan on the left. Certainly not what I would put on the back of a child's quilt, but perfectly serviceable for adult quilts. At least the fabrics have a nice, soft hand to offset their "meh" coloring.

The grey cable print does show the nice shape of the enclosed pod feathers. That sounds a bit like a mild curse, doesn't it? "Oh, pod feathers, madame!"

Here's a close up. One of those feather lobes is a bit mutant!

On the back of Pod Two...a very, very large pucker. Oh, no! Drat, darn, and pod feathers! I found the pucker after completely finishing the quilting, when the cross hatching was done from both directions. I considered ripping a bunch out, but then decided to try something different.

In this more distant shot, you can see that the backing fabric isn't particularly geometric. With the curved stitching moving your eye around, I think it is visually forgiving enough that I can just hand sew the pucker down into place, and it won't be very noticeable. So I put on the binding and will do the handwork in the next couple of days. Then we'll see how it fares after a trip through Mr. Whirlpool's Quilt Spa (AKA, my washer and dryer). If it looks bad, I can always rip it out later.

Linking up to Free Motion Mavericks.