Modern Maples Quilt Top

Hello!  If I seem particularly chipper, I am: this quilt top is very exciting and I'm so happy to share it!

I know many advanced quilters will wonder what the big deal is, but, to me, this quilt is so special.  I used some of my favorite fabrics, I used a pattern I've loved, and I just feel like I got it this time.  Do you know what I mean?  Something clicked and everything made sense.  Every part of sewing this was a dream; never once did I think, "Dear lord, just let this end already!"

Okay, so before the happiness becomes nauseating, let's see some pictures!

First, let's take a look at the blocks.  Each block consists of four HSTs, a solid square, three printed squares, and a stem.  The blocks are about 12" square, once all is said and done.  To make these, I used sixteen fabrics I had in my stash, two DS Quilts prints I picked up from JoAnn's, and white Kona.  Choosing the fabrics was fun but also a little nerve-wracking; I think I went back and forth on them for about a week, editing the stack everyday when I'd come up with a new idea.

Yuwa (left) and DS Quilts (right) blocks.  I bought the Yuwa on Etsy.

Whoops!  As soon as I took this picture, I realized my mistake in the lower left.  After I fixed it, this block became one of my favorites.

 Eleanor and Puddin' were there every step of the way for me, as usual.  One of the hard parts about having such a small apartment (and, therefore, a small sewing space) is there's nowhere to hide.  The cats always find me!

This is a Timeless Treasures print, I think...it's at least a few years old, and my mom gave it to me when she weeded out her stash.

Laying out all eighteen blocks.  The cats are inspecting every inch for quality control.

Looking at the photo above, I realize my mistake in the fifth row--one of the blocks should be in space two instead of space five.  Ah well.  It's something I didn't catch in time, but it didn't affect anything in the long run.

It's a bit of a random layout, which is fine.  I knew I wanted my favorite blocks to form the center column, which is the only column without a white block.  From there, I tried to balance the amount of orange and gray in the upper and lower halves, so one wouldn't look super heavy over the other.

From the top left: Timeless Treasures, Lizzy House Guising, Flea Market Fancy, Cloud9 Monsterz, MoMo Half-Moon Modern, Yuwa, Flea Market Fancy, Far Far Away III, Guising (two prints next to each other), Guising, Far Far Away III, Monsterz, DS Quilts, Flea Market Fancy, DS Quilts, Guising, Far Far Away III.

This was not a particularly taxing quilt, which maybe led me to have more fun with it.  Everything fit together, I was happy with the layout and I worked with some of my favorite fabrics and fabric lines.

We've had such wonderful weather lately--the temperatures this morning were in the 40s and 50s, but it was sunny.  Perfect for taking pictures!  Unfortunately, it was a little muddy, so I worried about that, but I think it turned out okay.

I would like to note that the DS Quilts fabric is incredibly high-quality--a nice surprise for something from JoAnn's.

So there it is--my fall quilt!  Horror of horrors, I think I'm going to quilt and bind this one myself.  I am terrified.  However, thanks to no money, I can delay it a few weeks until I can buy backing and binding.  Do you have any suggestions?  I'd like to back it in something orange and bind in navy--Hope Valley comes to mind, but I may be offbase there.

What did you make over the weekend?  Also, as you know, Ariel is on holiday in Greece (boo hiss) (just kidding, but seriously, I'm at work and she's in Greece!), so I'll be back Wednesday with another post!  See you then.