Hammertime (aka The Quilt Formerly Known as 'Sheen')

In January of this year, our St. Louis Modern Quilt Guild kicked off its Robert Kaufman Solids Only Challenge.  Using a Kona Charm Pack in the Classics palette and only one or two additional solid fabrics, we were to design and complete a quilt with an outer perimeter between 120 and 180 inches to present in time for our June 11th meeting.  Having only joined the guild this past April, I got off to a late start, and (will gladly use that as the reason I ) was still hand-sewing my binding on at 5:15 Saturday morning.  Needless to say, one accidental nap later, and I was sprinting out the door, thirty-minutes late.  A rather inauspicious start for the girl who gets turned around the minute she crosses the Mississippi River on her way to our meetings each month to begin with.

Stupid TomTom...

At any rate, the ladies definitely came through, with 44 of our members presenting their quilts to a captive audience.  A few of the photos are up on our STLMQG Flickr page, and I hope we see many more to come.

The inspiration for this quilt was originally the sheen that you see on the back of a compact disk. Each 2.5-inch block was my less-precise version of the Endless Chain pattern available on the Quilter's Cache website, but down-sized to fit our challenge requirements.  Of course, down-sizing meant that the "spoke" corner of each block had nine layers of fabric stacked up at one point.  Once you join FOUR of those points together, that's 9...  18...  27...  A veritable BUTTload of fabric coming together at one seam.  

Photo courtesy of http://www.123rf.com/.

Thankfully for me, May brought a welcome 12-hour quilting retreat sponsored by my local quilt shop, the Quilted Garden, at St. John's United Methodist Church in Edwardsville.  As I fussed and repositioned my 144 tiny squares on the design wall, each of the lovely, God-fearing ladies around me would stop by my table, encourage my efforts, and wish me the best.  Which was all fine and good until I started sewing those mega seams together, and the under-my-breath bleeps started flying.  I was literally standing on my tip-toes, leaning with all of my might on the center of each block, willing the iron (which was steaming up a three-foot radius around me at this point) to smoosh those corners into place when a soft-spoken woman with fluffy white hair tapped me lightly on the shoulder and said, "Here, Honey.  Try this."    

Apparently, when God closes a door, he opens a tool box.

Between this divine intervention, and the spiraling, meteoric downfall of this guy, it was decided a name change was in order.  So, at last, I present to you, Sheen "Hammertime."

More information on the process behind making this quilt can be found on the WIPs tab of this blog.

Thanks for visiting!