"Peace": another project finished!

The Reader's Digest version is that in July 2012, I completed the hand work on a needleturn applique wall-hanging.  The top was put on the Pile of Tops to be Quilted and there it sat.  And sat. And sat.

Eventually, it became an item on my (infamous) List of 17 (tops to be quilted).  And still it sat there.  Very patiently waiting its turn.

Which I can NOW happily say has come!  I have finished the quilting and the binding and the labeling AND the hanging sleeve!  Woo hoo!!  This puppy is done!   :-)

I'm pleased with the stitch in the ditch around the appliques; this is no mean feat with a longarm!  I *much* prefer SITD on my home sewing machine; the control is much greater.  

I'm not entirely certain I chose the absolutely, 100% "correct" quilting for the background around the applique.  It works; I think it looks fine but wonder if I couldn't have found something better if I had only looked for about a gazillion hours longer. :-)  I tend to get impatient after only a bazillion hours.

I'm *very* pleased with the binding.  There is a long, vertical, high-contrast division between the background fabric and the applique fabric.  I didn't want the binding to be a distraction so I used the applique fabric on the applique and the background fabric on the background.  Normally, when I join the ends of my binding, I do a diagonal seam.  This distributes the bulk of the seam allowance over a greater distance and makes for a flatter binding.

But if I did that on this project, the diagonal seam would be horridly obvious.  Instead, I made a straight, vertical seamline in the binding to match up with the division on the wall-hanging.

Those pictures are just teasers! For all the gory details, links and more pictures, please visit my web page for the Peace wall-hanging.