Quote Originally Posted by Rhonda Lee View Post
Sheri.a, Absolutely gorgeous! Your quilt is a work of art! And I'm noticing a blue ribbon in the background! Was this a paper pieced quilt? I know a lot of Judy Neimeyer's patterns are paper pieced. A large quilt 109x109 would be a trial no matter what they were, but this one is beyond most expectations. Please tell how you made this lovely quilt, and did you hoop each design you quilted. I am so impressed. Thank you so much for sharing.
Thank you for the compliment. Yes, this is paper pieced. Judy does a wonderful job in her pattern instruction. My Janome has a hoop (with magnets) for quilting that is 8.7" Sq. The blocks are 10" sq so I hooped each block three times to get the designs on it. I did not use any stabilizer.

I purchased 2 digital designs from Judy's website (the top and inner square on each fan), but then had to turn to EQ Stitch to create custom designs for around the star points, the blocks with no piecing, and the border.

there was a lot of trial and error..... Things I learned:
- pay attention to the density and stitch length of the digital design to have a more even appearance
- on the borders The amount of quilting was more towards the inside than outside so I ended up with wavy borders
- I struggled with tension so I used a bobbin holder with low tension
- the judge commented that I had too many thread stops on the back
- I made a sampler quilt (6 blocks) to practice designs. It was cut down and bound to go under our TV - I couldn't throw away all of that work!
- each hooping took around 20 minutes, so I had to stay focused to keep it from becoming a very expensive UFO.