Quilting for Dummies

Okay, so I've only been quilting for what, a quarter century now--you'd think I'd be past making certain mistakes that you do when you're starting out, right?  Well, no.  Here's my latest.

I've just finished a new design and actually had already posted a picture of it earlier today.  Here it is.

Nice, right?  I was very proud of it and eager to share it with you.  It's called "Garden Pathways" and was designed with the "Perennials" fabric line by my favourite Moda designers, Kansas Troubles Quilters.  The pattern will be printed this week and added to my website.

So I published my post.  But then I noticed something odd.  Can you see it?  If you can, I may need to hire you to proof my patterns!

If you said the top right corner block, you get a gold star.  Yes, I'd sewn the bottom left corner of this block the wrong way--it should be rotated clockwise.  I almost cried.  And being someone who preaches "celebrating our imperfections because they make our quilts unique", I was sorely tempted to let it go.  If I'd just made the quilt for myself, I would have left it.  But, because it's a pattern, I really couldn't publish the picture as it was.  So I deleted my post and out came the seam ripper.

But first, I had to figure out a way to trace the machine quilting so that I'll (hopefully) be able to duplicate it.  I got some plastic food wrap, placed it over the stitching, and traced it with a felt pen.

Then I removed the offending block.

Rotated it and pinned it (correctly this time) in place.

And hand-stitched it to the surrounding blocks.

That's better.  (It's the piece with the pin.)

Now I just have to buy a spool of the thread my machine-quilter used, trace the design onto the quilt and try to sew it so that the new quilting blends in.

What have I learned from this experience? 

That there will always be new ways to screw up and that I will continue to do so. 

Such is life.