Wow, was I honoured when The Quilters’ Guild of South Australia Festival of Quilts Committee asked me to quilt the raffle quilt for 2016. When I heard it was a New York Beauty with lots of open spaces I must admit, I was a bit nervous. How was I going to fill all those spaces? Pieced by the committee members in 2015 it finally arrived in my quilt studio in January 2016. I knew straight away the elements needed were feathers, beading and some Nemishing. Thanks Bethanne Nemish of White Arbor Quilting for this new background filler! The blocks were laid out in a barn raising pattern so I decided to quilt something different in each round. I started with the tiny feathers between each spike and as I worked through these my mind began filling with design elements for the other areas. Once I had completed the center I continually felt like I was looking inside a decorative basket and that each round was the sides of the basket. Crazy? I don’t know but I kept calling it my basket of beauties, cos there were heaps of them! After 58 hours of quilting I was so attached to this quilt it was very hard to hand it over! My goal in quilting this quilt was to ensure the Guild sold as many tickets as possible, however secretly I hope to win it back. How surprised and honoured (again) that the Festival Committee retained my name for the quilt, Basket of Beauties. Tickets will be on sale soon just $2 each.
