the great hexie quilt of 2016.

before we left for the first leg of the lidbom rambling road show, i purchased a bundle of carkai by carolyn friedlander. i determined that it was my christmas present, and i had no idea what my plan was, since i wasn’t going to be taking my sewing machine on the trip. but i loved it.
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i decided that my best (and most brainless) option was to make hexies and just hand sew them together randomly.
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i sewed that first set together and i was in love. and i was also realizing that this was going to be quite an undertaking.
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i chugged away. one set at a time, so i wouldn’t be left with a bunch of one kind of fabric at the end. and i could make sure my randomness was perfectly planned. 😉
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three sets…
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five sets. and you probably didn’t notice that the background of the pic is the old kitchen table at the house. here’s what that means. in our 6 week trip, i sewed five sets of 28 hexies together. that’s 140 hexies. i predicted that this project would take about 12 years and debating just making a pillow.
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it sat for awhile, as i decided whether to make a pillow or quilt. i had some helpful suggestions from friends. we began the second leg of our trip. i worked on it in spurts. but then in maine, i got my second wind…
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in the last two months of the trip, i made tons of progress. i ended up with a 19″ x 80″ strip of 585 hexies.
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when we arrived home (or derek’s parent’s home, that is), i was on a mission to get it quilted. i stopped by some fabric shops and picked up some essex yarn dyed linen for the background and some 108″ friedlander backing fabric. then, during a long sewing day at my fave quilt shop, sewingly yours, i got this beast quilted.
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i bound it in this blue cross hatchy print from the same line and i was in love. hazel too.
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of course, upon completion, i made derek model it for me.
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seriously. i couldn’t love it more.
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my original plan was to quilt horizontal lines. but i was worried about keeping them straight. because my hexies weren’t as good a guide that way. so, i decided i would do a grid. but of varying width lines. so like a plaid pattern. i started with the verticals. and it took soooooo long. so i just did vertical. and i actually like it.
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when i spread it out, hazel asked “can i roll around on it” so obviously i let her and obviously i took pics.
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so, that’s the story of the roadshow quilt. hopefully my machine will be making the trip on the next leg. i’ve missed the old girl. and hate hand sewing.

3 Replies to “the great hexie quilt of 2016.”

  1. katie yoakum says:

    it turned out awesome Sarah

  2. […] already posted about finishing up my carkai hexie roadshow quilt, but i also did a ton of other sewing while we stayed at the grandlibom’s […]

  3. So insanely cool! Love the hexie quilt!

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