Finished Rebel Quilt

Sunday, December 1, 2019

After having an unfinsihed quilt top hanging over the fireplace for months, I finally got some motivation to finish it off before work gets crazy busy again. The quilt is Libs Elliott's Rebel Quilt, heavily inspired by Tara Sews' interpretation. The gray backing with solid colors were great - I like her color choices more than my own!



I winged this without a pattern, as all the blocks are fairly simple. The original pattern was automatically generated by a computer algorithm, so I didn't mind going in and changing a few things to suit my needs. First off, the quilt is half-sizes, intended to just fit above the fireplace. Through some miracle, it just barely works (after having lost a couple inches off all sides in the washing/drying process). Secondly, I wanted to tone down the bright white blocks a tiny bit.



For the quilting, I did straight lines, changing direction 90-degrees at a 'V' shape in the middle of the quilt. I did not do the correct thing of switching starting sides for each line, and so I ended up with a lot of stretching of the fabrics in one direction or another. Even the washing/drying process didn't fully help it recover. But it still works alright.

And for once I actually did what I've been saying I'd do for awhile, and attached the binding in reverse. This way the binding folded edge is attached to the front of the quilt, and the second seam line that usually goes around the quilt edge is on the back. So it doesn't matter if it's not perfectly straight, since it's hidden back there. 100% recommended to future self.


Rather than embed hanging sleeves into the quilt so it would also be a wall-hanging, I chose to attached sleeves after-finishing, so they can be removed at any point. This turned out to be a wise idea, as the quilt shrunk quite a bit and this way I can adjust the quilt sleeve to be at the perfect height. As it is, I think I put them in an inch too high. The quilt would look better in its tight place if it was a bit lower. I followed Quilting Weekly's instructions for attaching hanging sleeves, here.

I attached two separate quilt sleeves in order to leave space for the curtain rod's central support hook, this seems to function as desired. The quilt sleeve is not just a fabric tube pressed down, you need to provide a little give for the depth of the curtain rod to not stretch the quilt, so following actual instructions on this front is wise.