Global Garden - Hands2Help Comfort Quilt

Here is my second H2H quilt for this year, the first being my SAHRR which you can see here. Hands2Help, in case you don't know, is an annual comfort quilt drive hosted by Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict. I named it Global Garden as a nod to the Trip Around the World corner blocks, the floral fabrics, and the centre garden-themed appliquéd block.

After I rummaged through my drawer of lonely blocks aka orphan blocks to choose one for my SAHRR, it hit me that I really should make an effort to work more of them into a couple of quilts. In the drawer were these five blocks, the centre appliqués one and four Trip Around the World ones. I ‘won’ them in a bidding activity we did in the local guild I belonged to at that time. That was more than six years ago! Out they came and I let them percolate a bit on the design wall until I ‘saw’ the idea of using big, 15” finished, QSTs to frame and pull them together. 

A note about my Rainbow Neighbourhood QAL: that post will be out this afternoon.

The deeper rose fabric is an early Benartex Fossil Fern left over from a quilt I made for my mum’s 70th birthday in 2006. That doesn’t seem that long ago until I do the math: 17 years! It took almost all of it to make the triangles. Two of the four fabrics had enough to cut a 16.25” square twice across the diagonals; two did not, so I had to use one of the ones cut from a square as a template, being sure to have the straight of grain on the long edge of the triangles.

Since I posted the top on Instagram, I decided to add a 2” finished border around it using the Cranston dusky pink. That fabric I used to make chair pads, each one with yards upon yards of ruffled fabric, for my solid oak chairs (my pride and joy that set and no, I’m still not totally over having to almost give it away when we left Alberta) and various accessories for my then pink, grey and white with touches of blue, kitchen, such as a tea cosy which I happened to use this weekend when Dayna and I had tea!

I did an all-over meander, using Essential thread from Connecting Threads - affiliate link - (**hope you've checked out their site-wide sale: use the code SEWSAVE25) my favourite fat flower design, a jigsaw-style meander between, and a few loops. It’s fairly wide open so the quilt is nice and drapey, not a word but you know what I mean! Lovely texture.

Ew!! Do you see the bug on my quilt there?! Did not notice until uploading it!

For the appliqué block, I wanted something a little bit special so I switched threads from the dusky pinky-beige to a cream and did lines in the background 1” apart, echoed the shapes, stitched a few veins on the leaves, petals detail, and did swirls in the flower centre and butterfly wings.

When I was looking for the star points fabrics, I came across a sweet, brown tiny floral, which didn’t have enough for triangles, but almost enough for binding. I just had to find 1.5 more brown strips, not a problem! The pink and brown look good together, and it works for the whole quilt.

I'd show you the back but I can't until June 21. I used one of the quilt backs patterns from Kelly Young's new book, Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs. This is SUCH A GOOD BOOK!!

I can give you a peek at one of the oh-so-perfect pieces of fabric used on the back:

Butterflies! I may have squealed a little when I saw that piece in my stash of chunks!

I've now laundered it so it’s nice and soft and crinkly. I sometimes shake my head at myself for throwing brand new quilt on the grass for photos...

I’m very pleased with what those orphan blocks became! This will be going to Quilts for Survivors, a non-profit based in Timmins, ON, who distributes quilts to survivors of Canada's residential schools. Completed quilts may be sent directly to a survivor, so I'll be emailing to see if that is maybe the route I will go with this one!

Also, this will count as one of my PHD quilts since I've had the five blocks sitting, waiting to grow up into a quilt since I brought them home 6+ years ago and promised to do just that.

Quilt Stats:

Pattern: my own layout

Size: 49.5" x 49.5"
Fabric: scraps and stash and orphan blocks made by someone else

Batting: Fairfield low loft polyester

Backing: scraps

Quilted: on Avril:  44 028 stitches

Threads: pieced with polyester; quilted with Essential cotton using Fawn and Parchment; The Bottom Line in the bobbin

Linking up

TGIFF at Anja Quilts

Confessions of a Fabric Addict

From Bolt to Beauty

Alycia Quilts

Quilting Gail

Songbird Designs