An engagement on Christmas Eve last year meant that it was time for this mother of-the-bride to make another wedding quilt! Luckily Melissa had a few ideas on the type of quilt that she wanted - something modern, something neutral with a pop of color, and king size - so we turned to Pinterest to see what we could find. The pattern called Emerald City from Quiltmaker checked off everything on her list. All I had to do was purchase and download the pdf and I was set to start on this project.
It was several months later, however, before I was able to purchase the fabric for this quilt. We traveled to Memphis, TN in June for a family wedding and I thought that would be the perfect time to make my first trip to the Missouri Star Quilting Company in Hamilton, MO on the way. It was nice to have a project for which to shop and I was able to find all of the fabric that I needed. After returning home from our trip I washed the fabric with a Color Catcher and began the process of cutting according to the directions on the pattern. This included the exact sizes needed for the paper pieces. In my experience most patterns are not that specific when cutting fabric for paper piecing but it sure was a lot less wasteful.
In this pattern it is only the diamond shapes that are achieved using the paper piecing technique. The rest of the quilt is pieced using the usual method. A few specialty tools that I found useful when paper-piecing are Carol Doak’s Foundation Paper, the Add-A-Quarter ruler, a 4” x 6” index card, and the Roll and Press tool. You can substitute other items but if you are going to do this technique often then these tools would be a wise investment. The foundation paper is the perfect weight for this technique and works very well in my printer. The Add-A-Quarter ruler is a quick and easy way to make sure that you are getting a true 1/4” seam. This was the first time that I had used the Roll and Press tool and it made pressing the seams so much easier and more precise.
After the 112 diamonds were constructed, my next task was to make 296 four-patch squares of varying color combinations. While the basic construction of this top was fairly simple, it was time-consuming because of the sheer number of parts that I was required to make. Because of the simplicity, however, it was also a relaxing pattern on which to work.
After the top was completed the next decision to be made was the quilting design. My two choices were a custom design or an all-over. I opted for the all-over for a couple of reasons. First of all - time. I didn’t feel like I had the time to spend on a custom design as I had delayed beginning this project and was ready to quilt it only two months before the wedding. Given the number of customer quilts that I was scheduled to do I just did not have the time to work on a custom king-sized quilt. Secondly, and even more importantly, was the fact that I really wanted the fabrics and pattern to shine in this quilt and an all-over design would allow for that.
For some reason I ended up with quite a bit of leftover fabric from this project. In some cases I had a yard or more extra. So my mom volunteered to make pillow shams to match the quilt. She took one of the block designs and placed them in each corner. I then quilted them with the same design as I used on the quilt. It was the perfect finish for this special gift and has a piece of both the mother-of-the-bride and the grandmother-of-the-bride!
