So what can I say? He's done. He's huge. He's made of over 700 pieces of selvage. Yes, I am sane. He's my favourite selvage quilt I've made. (So far.) He's my own design. He was free-pieced as I went along.-
I went a little wild with the pictures. It was fun! Click any picture to enlarge. More info on the quilt and that giant snowman in the background are below.
The quilting was done at my local quilt store by long-arm. Thanks Tina! It's a free-style all over stipple done in white thread. Tina (Tina Hanson of Town and Country Quilts, Rothesay, NB) does a great job. On this quilt I think the quilting looks like wind swirling in a snowstorm.
I couldn't believe how the giant snowman's colours coordinated with the quilt!
For an idea of the size of the quilt, here it is on a Queen size mattress. I wasn't planning on making it that big, but people kept giving me selvages to include! (Which was awesome.)-
On the subject, I get a lot of questions about how I get so many selvages to use for my quilts. They aren't all from my own fabrics -- not even close. If I had to rely on only my own selvages I could have maybe made a table runner, but never a queen size quilt. I am so fortunate to have "met" blogland friends who volunteered to send me some selvages, plus local friends and my Mom who gather them for me too. I love the recycling aspect of selvage quilting -- using these bits that would have been discarded otherwise.
Here's a close up of his head. It is fun to carefully choose the placement of selvages. There is one that says "Peas and Carrots" right near his nose.
Close up of the bottom snowball.
The border. I alternated Christmas fabrics between selvages.
The backing is from the Rainbow Garden line by Prints Charming. It is so soft. I love it.-
The dark turquoise and red in the quilt are Kona cottons. The light turquoise is Northcott.
I signed and dated it right on the front on some selvages. The signature is in the lower right of the quilt. It is dated 2010 because all the piecing was done just before Christmas.-
If you are interested, I wrote a tutorial on how to make the selvage snowflakes. The link is on my sidebar.
Just for fun, here's a blooper reel pic. I tell you, our "photo shoots" get more and more hilarious all the time. I am lucky my husband is such a good sport about it. We had to take a dining room chair along with us this time and it was tricky to get it level in the snow. Plus it was slippery with snow on it. The quilt was so huge it had to be clipped to a curtain rod. Plus it was windy! So anyway, believe me there were more out takes than decent photos.
So, about that giant snowman. His name is Gerby 2011. He is 20 feet 11 inches high. He is located in Saint John, NB. (About 20 minutes from where we live) He was made by a single man. Yes, WOW! The creator's name is Chris Brake. You can read an article about the making of the snowman here. It is really cool. After we took the pictures we probably stayed for another hour while the kids played around the snowman and in a big snow fort built beside it. Other people came along and took pics of the snowman too. It was a great outing for a sunny winter Saturday afternoon.-
Happy Quilting!
