Over the Waves

"Oh, Mexico Beach"

 86" x 86"

Jane Zillmer

Also known as "Shore Birds",  and at times "The Beast",  this quilt is finally finished.  Better photos will be taken when my new camera arrives and I find a non windy day to hang it outside and take pictures.

The skewed edges you see are caused by a slight breeze when I took this photo early this morning.   Prior to this, the border edges were just plain wavy.  Made me seasick.  Now, I know that the theme of this quilt is ocean and beach, but those kinds of waves are not desirable.

This set me into a panic. Who knew you needed to block a quilt after it's been quilted?  I always skip those chapters in my books.  With some excellent advice from Diane Gaudynski, hours of consternation (get my quilt WET?) and finally, just using common sense (as Diane advises), I accomplished what I set out to do.  After removing my first binding, blocking the entire quilt - twice - squaring and remarking a new outer edge, reattaching a new binding and doing a final block, it is as square and lovely as can be.. 

I first blogged about my inspiration and fabric choices for this quilt in January, 2012.  This is my Big Quilt for the year.  For the past 7 years, it has been my goal and pleasure to complete one large quilt each year.  Of course there have also been many small projects and patterns completed, and oh yes... a book written.  But I always have one major quilt in the works.  Most of these quilts are professionally long arm quilted.  "Oh, Mexico Beach" was quilted by Lisa Arndt.

Why do I make these big quilts?  First of all, I love looking at big quilts.  And I love the challenge of  designing and completing these quilts which each tell a story about something in my life. I guess they are big stories to tell. 

And for 2013?  That quilt is still just in my head.