It is Done!

Awhile back, I made a pledge to finish my Christmas Tree Skirt. I can now say, it is finished, completely finished. It won't win any prizes, since it won't ever be entered in any contest, but it is done.
While I was working on quilting, Mary Fons announced an essay contest, on her blog. so, while I was quilting, I composed an essay about the quilt. in my head. I typed it up, and printed it. I even mailed it to Mary. So, binding finished, I will share my essay with you.

I bought a kit to make a Christmas Tree Skirt, a number of years ago. It is in blues, greys, white and sage greens. The colours are not traditional Christmas colours, but I liked them. I bought the kit during a post Christmas clearance at an on-line quilt shop. So it arrived in January, of 2010, I think.

There is a problem with making a Christmas tree skirt. One only thinks about it in late November, when one is too busy to do anything about it, so it gets forgotten for another year.

The October after I bought the kit, I took it to a quilt retreat and spent the weekend making the blocks. The blocks are nine patches and snowballs, set on point, with setting triangles. By the end of the weekend, I had the blocks completed and the blocks sewn into rows. I was sure I could get it finished by Christmas.

About two years later, I sewed the rows together. Then I started planning how I would quilt it. The snowballs should have free motion quilting, I thought. Maybe snowflakes, or something. Of course, I don’t do free motion quilting, but that didn’t seem to be a problem. I put it away, and planned to learn some free motion.

I came across it before Christmas, 2016. I decided that this was it, it would be finished by Christmas. Of course, I hadn’t figured into that thought that, this year, there was a new grandson, and he would need a Christmas stocking. The new grandson, himself, would take much of my attention. It wasn’t finished by Christmas.

In February, I decided that the only way I was going to finish this, was to try to work on it every day. Forget the free motion, straight lines would do fine. Even if I only did one row of quilting, each time I sat down at the machine, it would eventually get finished. Of course, I would need to be able to set up the machine and just leave it, so that I could do a row, whenever I had a chance.

So, whenever I have had a few minutes, I have added a row or two to the quilting.  I am quilting it on my 1939 Singer machine, a wonderful flea market find. Since I haven’t quilted on this machine before, it isn’t my best work, but it is okay. After all, the finished product is going to lay on the floor, with presents piled on it, and probably a cat sleeping on it. As I sew, I revel in the engineering that went into my 1939 beauty. I wonder what her story is. The decals are pristine, so the machine was barely used. The machine is sitting in front of a window, where I can see the street, and watch the snow, the neighbours, and the kids coming home from school. The time passes quickly.

Now, the quilting is done. The binding is made. I will trim the quilt and add the binding, either tonight, or tomorrow. I will take the quilt to my quilt group on Monday and show it proudly, at Show and Tell. It is done. It isn’t perfect, but it is done.