Finished my quilt today

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You know, I learned something about quilting these past few days. I love to quilt, but I’m not that great at it. *grin* I told my mother-in-law tonight that it’s the piecework that I really love. The quilting itself, and the binding, not so much.

I ended up machine quilting it. It took me about a day and a half to completely quilt it. THAT was nice. For the stars, I did stitch in the ditch. I’m not good at that. For the sashing, I just outlined it, using my presser foot as a guide. That part looks a lot better. Stephen picked me up some matching thread, so the navy sashing has navy quilting and the burgundy border has burgundy quilting. I used the colors in the bobbin thread too. Cream would have looked nicer, but I was worried about the bobbin thread coming up from the bottom of the quilt and showing on the top.

Then the binding went on today. There was enough left over from my last quilt, but it was too narrow. I took the leftover backing material and cut binding from that.

I learned quite a few lessons making this quilt. It’s not perfect, by any means. There was some quilting I thought about ripping out, but I’m going to leave it that way. Here’s why. This quilt is an object lesson for me.

Making the stars took a lot of time, and learning to sew the triangles accurately was difficult. I rushed through a lot of it. I also spent a lot of that time praying. Not for any one specific request, really, I just used that quiet, creative time praying about things.

Then I put the quilt away for a while. Partly because I wasn’t sure how to finish it and partly because I didn’t have the supplies I wanted to finish it.

After that, I got it out and was able to work on it more and was able to order the fabric to finish it. And mostly, I just decided to use what I had. I like it that way.

From a distance, it’s beautiful. I love it. Close up, I see the flaws. I see corners that don’t match, triangles that look funny, and blocks that don’t quite line up. I was able to hide some of that with creative quilting. But some of the other quilting is obviously not straight and could have been done better.

It makes me think about my prayer life. How many times have I set out to pray, and yet didn’t finish? Or prayed, but didn’t believe that God would really answer my prayer? And what about the times when I just prayed haphazardly, just like when I pieced together triangles without being as careful as I could have? Yes, the quilt is beautiful, but if I had taken more time and been more careful, the results would have been truly breathtaking.

It really is an object lesson for me. So, because of that, I intend to leave it the way it is. Crooked stitching, mismatched corners, wrinkled backing and all.

And it is also a reminder for me to try harder. When I make my next quilt, especially if it is a special quilt, I will take my time and do my best. The end result is worth it.

Lord willing, I’ll be able to say the same thing about my prayer life.