Paper-Pieced Stag Wedding Quilt

In December I began looking for the perfect fabric and pattern to make a quilt for friends that were getting married in April.

I wanted something hunting related or camouflage, but feminine at the same time, was that even possible?

Then I saw Brambleberry Ridge by Violet Craft in the Hawthorne Threads Newsletter. I fell in love immediately. I knew it was the perfect fabric.




I found several options for quilt patterns, but I was so drawn to Violet Craft's Forest Abstraction quilt, which is a paper pieced quilt. I decided to take the plunge and just do it. I decided to only try to do one block, the Stag, and then frame  it with coordinating fabric to make it larger.



I had a few complications as the process began, my printer doesn't print 11X17, so I traced the templates off of my computer screen. Yes, that was a bit crazy and I will definitely take the pattern to be printed if I do more in the future.

It had been quite some time since I paper pieced, so there was a bit of a re-learning curve. In fact I completely messed up the first 8 or sections. I had to re-trace those and start over. Also, I remembered why it is important to use the smallest stitch setting so that when you are removing the paper it comes off easily. I did not do that at first, and had some issues with my seams coming undone after I had put my pieces together.

I found this post (here) from the Violet Craft Blog helpful as I began piecing. Also, one of my very favorite blog posts/tutorials on paper piecing is from Six White Horses, you can find it here.

I think this project would have gone fairly quickly had I been able to dedicate several hours at a time to it, but unfortunately I can only steal a few minutes here and there between work, kids, the house, and church responsibilities. It took all of February and most of March for me to piece the Stag together. It was so rewarding to see all of the different pieces come together.

Once I got the Stag pieced together I had to make some decisions about framing it out so that the quilt would be the size I wanted.. 

I used Timber Valley in Fog from the collection along with more Cotton Couture Eggplant to create a lap sized quilt. I was a bit scared to quilt it because I didn't want to "mess-up" the Stag or the look of the quilt. I decided to take the plunge and free motion quilt around the Stag with a "tree bark" design. I used "very dark eggplant" Aurifil Cotton 40wt Machine Quilting and Embroidery Thread.

I had a very hard time capturing the quilting on camera. It did turn out very nice and was a great choice for the "rustic chic" quilt... 

My sweet in-laws and hubby helped me take the quilt for a little photo shoot before I had to give it away. I'll be honest, I fell in love with this quilt, and was a little sad that it wasn't mine to keep. But I was so thrilled to give it away to an awesome couple and I hear they love it!