Baptist Fan Quilt Finished

I finished one of the charity quilts for the Orange Tree Quilter group. Took me a bit longer than expected as I had other things popping up throughout the week.

Looks great! Quilted with Aurifil 40/2 cotton thread in a pale green colour.

Still thinking about the ruler situation. I quilted this with three of Amanda Murphy's circle rulers and two of the Handiquilter rather largish Circle rings. While this was do-able, I did not manage to keep this consistent from row to row. Was pretty happy with my vertical alignments, but horizontally I seemed to struggle and it was different somewhat from row to row, i.e. while the fans did align with the one underneath in width most of the times, the individual lines are often in slightly different places. I think at times I was ever so slightly just sliding over (to the right mainly). Not that you can see that without knowing where exactly to look. You can see it in the last row...I reckon that I slid over by a good 1/4in. Never mind, this is why I love this pattern for scrappy quilts. Just looks great, no matter how you managed to get it on your quilt and for a smaller quilt well worth the effort.

Linking up to Midweek Makers Linky Party over at Susan's blog 'Quilt Fabrication'. Have been rather slack in the last few months and not linked up anywhere and definitely feel I am missing out on lots of creative goodness. So much talent out there!

Karin

Baptist Fan Rulers

I am continuing on my Baptist Fan quilt. Struggling a bit with the rulers I have but as this is a smaller quilt, I am almost at the end.

Looking good, although several fans have shifted over a little bit so accuracy is not that great. However, I do love the pattern and its texture as it is so forgiving. Unless you go on it with a measuring tape, those inaccuracies are not noticeable at all. I did use a combination of rulers for this...3 of Amanda Murphy's Circle rulers and 2 of Handiquilters Circle rings. Have most of the issues with the HQ Circle rulers. The bigger ones are just too awkward to hold.

Since then I have explored the internet for other options. Looked at the Westalee Circle template, but did not like the idea of having a pin going through the fabric and taking it in and out as I go along. You want to make this as user friendly as possible. I thought that I prefer half circle shapes to hold.

Came across Michael Davison from QuarterSquaredQuilts when trolling through Etsy. He sells Machine Quilting Rulers and quilting fabric on Etsy. Nice little shop. There also is a You Tube video on him demonstrating his Baptist Fan Set of 5 rulers. ( I will not post a photo as I would have to copy one of his photos and I am always reluctant to do that) Those rulers are exactly what I am looking for...(sigh!). The rulers are simply but cleverly marked in a green colouring. The markings on the rulers allow him to align the starting point for each fan exactly while at the same time also aligning to the fans underneath. Doing my quilt at the moment I can see how useful this would be... (double sigh!). I am currently almost going blind on my quilt, just aligning it as best as I can. While that works, the right tools would be great.

Unfortunately or fortunate for US buyers the man is from Texas and posting charges are preventing me from getting these rulers. Not that they are too high, I reckon given the weight and how they have to be posted, the charges are what they are...it is just a bugger that I am so far away. Maybe I should convince the man to export to Australia, he's got quite a range of nice rulers in his Etsy shop.

If you are looking for Baptist Fan rulers check out Michael's shop. He also recently brought out a new version of the set which allows for different spacing when used in conjunction with the original set. Very cool.

Karin