The Goldfinch

The Goldfinch 30" x 40"

This one was less than 6 months from start to finish. I found the Goldfinch pattern at LegitKits.com after seeing the company at a quilt show in February. After seeing the patterns I couldn't stop thinking about them so the next week I jumped online and picked out the Goldfinch to try. Most people buy these at full kits with solid Kona fabrics provided. I decided to make mine with hand dyd fabrics.
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Just picking the fabrics took a long weekend to accomplish but it was a fun and satisfying project.
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The quilt is all foundation pieced and there are lots of little pieces and sections. ​

The quilt is made from 16 7.5" x 10" blocks and each block is made of a lot of little sections.
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This block in the lower right corner took the longest time to piece. 
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The quilting was a bit of a challenge because these patterns are designed with a lot of seams meeting at some points. I searched online to see how other people had quilted quilts from this company to get some ideas. I wasn't inspired by what I saw. Most people really avoided the thick intersections and the resulting effect was a pronounced puffy lump in those areas. I decided that I wanted my quilt to be very flat and have more of a tapestry effect and hang very flat on the wall. I decided to try denim as the "batting" and I'm really happy with the way it turned out.  I washed and dried it twice to shrink it and it quilted so easily.
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Within the bird and foliage, I quilted straight lines adjacent to  the seams (to avoid some of the bulk). I just wanted to do enough to stabilize the quilt. I was not trying to add any additional design elements so that the fabrics and piecing take center stage.
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The background was kind of a vast space so I decided to add a graphic leaf motif to frame the Goldfinch.
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