steeplechase

This mustang print from Melody miller’s Mustang line is a definite favorite, and I immediately wanted to see it in a quilt. I’ve had this antique quilt pinned for a while and thought it might be a fun way to show off those mustangs.

Not being much of a planner, I found I didn’t have the right solids on hand, except for a couple double gauze solids. I decided to go with that medium blue, but quickly found that not only did I not have enough, I couldn’t even find it available online at that time. No problem – I figured I’d add in the gold as well, but of course I didn’t have enough of that one either. In the end I had to pull out four different solid double gauze solids to come up with enough background fabric. It did change my design, but I think it was for the best!

I probably would have just randomly placed the squares, but once my background become color blocked, I thought it would be fun to group my four main prints. I kept a few of the squares ‘blank’ (used the background fabric rather than a print), and cut all the triangles for my flying geese by hand for more of an improv look.

When it came time to quilt it I first considered some wavy horizontal quilting. I quilted a few lines and then spent time ripping them all out when I found it wasn’t quite what I had in mind. Instead I went with some narrow straight line quilting on the diagonal. As luck would have it, I found a beautiful variegated thread by Sulky that changed from gold to grey to yellowy-brown and works so perfectly with the four background solids.

(a little crosshatch quilting in a couple spots for fun!)

And the backing – mustangs, of course, along with the perfectly corresponding RJR aqua solid (toy boat) for the binding!