This is my Dear Jane®-project. I mostly do it as a challenge to learn
more about piecing, appliqueing and quilting. But I hope to finish this
big job some day. You can see the "real" Jane Stickle-quilt here:
http://www.dearjane.com
I don't follow the original colors, I like bright colors and I want
to use them :-) Brenda Papadakis has "taught me" in her book, that it is
MY quilt and nobody else's. But I use exactly the same fabric for
background everywhere, although it looks different. It is because of the
different quality of the pictures: some are digital photos, some are
scanned.
I have found my own way to work through the 169 centerblocks
now: I prepare a row with 13 blocks, chose the fabric and cut the
templates (freezer-paper). I don't make the row from 1 to 13, but make
those blocks I feel like making this day.
When I have finished a
block, I immediately sew on a 1 x 5" sashing on the right side of the
block (except on block 13 in each row). And when I have finished all the 13 blocks in a row (bingo!), I
sew the blocks together, sew on a sashing 1 x 65" (I cut it a little
longer) to the bottom of the row, and at last I sew the row to the
earlier finished rows. I also do all the sashing-work by hand!
Almost
all my blocks are handpieced and appliqued with freezer-paper templates
(very few are machine-pieced). I use C Jenkins freezerpaper bought as
letter-sheets. I cut these sheets into two sheets, and then it suits
perfectly to print the block-patterns from the DearJane®-CD. Mostly I
forget to mirror the print, but I have decided not to care. The blocks
are very pretty one or the other way :-)
As you can see on my
"bingo-chart" I have made a new decision about my Baby Jane: I want
to use it as a bedspread on my nice kingsize bed (whith a head- and
foot-bench). For that purpose the original size didn't fit too well.
The quilt will be to long and too narrow. So I have decided to move
the 13th horizontal row up as a 14th vertical row - as far as I can
see it will be fine that way.
June 2004: I have now decided
to finish my Dear Jane®-quilt in two pieces and thereafter join them
into one. This make the big quilt a little lesser troublesome to
quilt. Therefore, I have now "sandwiched" the upper part of the
quilt: top row triangles plus row 1-6 with triangles and sashings. I
began to handquilt in-the-ditch the sashings and triangles, but
realised that irt would be a too big job. So I have cheated a bit: I
have machine-quilted in-the-ditch around all sashings and around all
triangles. And from here I handquilt. Maybe it is a pity to
machinequilt, but finished is better than perfect! And my Dear Jane®
is not going to be a heirloom - I have no daughters. My quilt is
going to be a bedspread, and I want to have the opportunity to enjoy
it before I grow too old :-)
I (hand)quilt three lines inside the
plain triangles like Jane did. I am not sure how she measured, but I
make these lines with 1/2" distance. I could not find masking tape
that size, but my pharmacy sold nice surgical tape in the exact
right size. It is very nice to work with.
How I will quilt the
pieced blocks and triangles? I don't know yet...
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Dear Jane® is a registered trademark of
Brenda Papadakis
