Thread: Much Ado About So Little

My 4-year-old grandson wanted a quilt, and I wanted to make one quickly, so I chose to make really large blocks. He chose the car fabric. My drawings all looked great on paper with colored pencils, but I had to rip nearly the whole thing apart since the original blue that looked great in the store turned out to be periwinkle at home. His name is Clayton, so I thought I'd use Clay's Choice for the alternate blocks and make sashing that would resemble intersections of roads. I absolutely hate the outcome, but just don't have the energy to start again, and I figure a kid his age won't care much. But I could sure use help in coming up with a quilting strategy, since I want to try to machine quilt this, and I'm a true beginner at that. Will you help? Bless you all for your wonderful ideas!

It looks good to me. I understand what you mean when you say it looked great in the store - that happens with their lighting, sometimes I ask to take the fabric outside or to a door before I have it cut, because it does change. Your grandson is going to like it because he wanted a quilt from his grandmother and now he has it.

I think it is a great quilt. As far as quilting, I think being a beginner and already critical of the quilt I would opt for straight line quilting with a walking foot. Because you are already dissatisfied with the quilt you may amplify that in your first free motion quilting attempts which leave many beginners feeling even worse about their abilities. We are always our own worst critics. So rather than stress about your stitch length or tension or that circle looking more like a squarcle, I advocated using the walking foot and feed dogs. The quilt looks manageable in size for that. I always like a cross hatch done on point. I think a 2" grid would work well on this.

I think it looks great. You're just too close to the project. I agree with the all over stippling. Your grandson will love it, especially since he helped by choosing the fabric.

It looks fine to me. The Clay's Choice blocks kind of look like airplane propellers to me.

I would stitch in the ditch by the blue fabric/sashings and then whatever more straight-line quilting you think it needs to be "enough" quilting.

Cute top! SITD the sashing with your walking foot and then decide what you want to quilt in the squares. As Feline Fanatic mentioned, a simple cross hatch in the car squares. Depending on your batting requirements, just SITD around the red in the Vlay's Choice blocks may be enough.