25th Anniversary Quilt

 Bill and I are celebrating our 25th Anniversary today. We've added a few pounds and gray hairs, but we are still as happy together as we were in 1989.

My real reason for posting today is to show you the quilt I made for him. I was inspired by Thomas Knauer's code quilts. I started out by designing a Braille quilt, but I just wasn't feeling it. (ha!) I switched to Morse code because it is more meaningful to us as Bill is a communications guy.

If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen references to the super secret project. I couldn't really start until the wedding quilt top was done, but I did start prepping circles when I needed an applique break. The first photo is dated 11/7, but I'm pretty sure I started a day or two before that. The whole top was pieced in just two days, 11/17-18.  I knew I had to have the top done before Thanksgiving and our trip.

I decided early on that I could kill two birds with one stone and attach the circles with the quilting. I'm not a fan of raw edge applique, so the circles were prepared using Erin's method (without the stuffing) and then glue basted to the gray background squares.

 I used an assortment of blues from my stash, some leftover from Pete's quilt. The background is Kona Silver. I picked it out for the color without realizing how appropriate it was for a 25th anniversary!

I didn't leave myself much time for quilting. I only had 2 days to get it done before Christmas. I had originally planned something completely different to do something fun with the negative space, but it wasn't practical with limited time. Straight lines and serpentines had to be employed. 

I still needed to do some free motion in the blues to stitch down the circles. I used Aurifil 50 wt in gray #2600 and navy #2784 for the quilting.

The back was pieced from a big piece of Kona Medium Gray and a strip of blue print leftover from the back of the wedding quilt.

I had a small pile of dots and dashes leftover- just enough to spell out love for the label!

I presented the quilt to Bill at our anniversary party on Saturday. I gave him a Morse code key and made him figure it out! He knew what the first part said after just the first couple of letters.

 

It finished a little bigger than I planned. It covers the whole top of our bed.

Overall, I'm really happy with how it turned out. And Bill loves it!

25 Years!

66" X 77"

Started 11/6/14

Completed 12/23/14

P.S. If you don't want to take the time to decode the message, it says:

I only have eyes for you

Bill and Tina 25 years