Following HMQS in Salt Lake City, I got my two quilts home with judge’s comments. At first, I didn’t see what now is totally obvious, especially for Canterbury Knight, that there were some flaws in the quilt that needed attention. Sky Horse has a few comments, only one of which I can address…I need to stitch down the binding with closer stitching…the rest of the comments were things to store away for future quilts.
The thing that first threw me off and got me to fuming was the comment indicating the outside edge of “the quilt” was not straight. I took it up to my studio and measured it with my t-square and it is almost perfectly square. So after I calmed down, and took a real hard look at the quilt, I wondered why it took me all that time to actually see what the problem was. The judge did not mean the outside edge of the “quilt” but the outside edge of the central theme block. I had placed the braid that divided the central theme from the border on decidedly unstraight.
Who can tell what caused me to miss it before (along with all the starts and stops that needed more attention and a few track backs that weren’t very good). I think it might have been the many months I spent on the thing and a mind that didn’t want to admit I wasn’t finished with it.
But now that I have it home after not seeing it for a while, and got my nose back in joint, I could see them like beacons flashing there before me. OK, so could I fix it? I decided to try, by removing the braid where it was crooked and restitching it. Now it is much improved. Indeed, I think it is pretty darn straight. Note that I had done this four times before declaring it finished before. This fifth time, however, seems quite successful to me. I also did what I could about the trackbacks and starts and stops, which were the other negative remarks from the judges.
I just now rephotographed it. Here are the two photographs (note, the picture is better too, since I applied some of what I have since learned from my Ricky Tims 52 week photography class:
If you can’t immediately see the crooks and wiggles, look especially at the left side of the central theme around the tail of the bird. There are a few corrections on the right too.
I am now going to try to update the photograph with Houston. I was thinking I had entered it elsewhere too, but I found after checking that I haven’t yet. Phew!
Sew happy everyone! I have learned I need to look harder at my quilts before entering and to not immediately assume the judges don’t know what they are talking about. In this case, I knew the judges were the best, so I knew these were valid comments. Have a great week everyone.