Basket Case

Round 2 of the battle of the baskets is over. I was certain it would be a knock out, but it put up quite a fight! Let me take you back to the beginning. This was to be a "simple" basket quilt. Here was the plan...4 rows of 4 baskets (12 inch finished) with green setting squares and triangles...all set on point.
This was not going to work for me. Great plan...wrong color and no way to replace it. Then I had a BRILLIANT idea. I would make 4 six inch baskets and create setting squares. They are beautiful!!!Sweetheart thought they were very busy, especially when I got another row in there. I tended to agree with him. Somewhere in here, my friend Crispy began to do some incredible Electric Quilt designs to show me what my visions would actually look like. She is a WHIZ on EQ6!! Now I was to the point of becoming a Basket Case myself....hence the name of the quilt. It was about this time I actually thought of scrapping the whole thing and starting over with a totally new design. Then I thought, "What if I sash it with 1" sashing strips to break it all up and create some organization?" That is a lot of work! I am in too deep at this point. I cut some strips and pinned them up!
Now I would use either cream or the green as the setting triangles. It was wonderful. I sent an e-mail and attached a pic for Crispy. She saw something I did not see. Look at the left side of the picture. See how the blocks go out onto my green wall, and the white of the design wall creates a triangle? Crispy said, "What if you did a pieced setting triangle to make those blocks float?"

Um, I don't think so!!!!

This quilt has been a runaway train and now you want me to PIECE setting triangles?? You are talking 45 degree angles and measurements like 18 3/16!! Way outside my comfort zone. So what does she do?? She works up a EQ picture of both the pieced setting triangles and the plain setting triangles. Well the pieced setting triangles created a stunning quilt in comparison to the solid triangles. *heavy sigh* Here we go again. Cripsy sent me all the cutting and piecing info and away I went. I did not get very far.....here is a corner that is to attach to that square....Note those beautiful 45 degree angles!!!It comes no where near fitting. I sent the pic to Crispy...she checked her info and numbers and came back with "It should fit." She told me to hold tight and she e-mailed back and forth with the EQ people who could not figure it out either. We would need to wait til the next morning to hear more from them. Now know this...Crispy is a new friend. She does not know me at all and lives several states away from me. What a gal!!! I was thinking I may need to go back to solid triangles..."O ye of little faith". That night I got a late e-mail. The subject line was "OMGosh I figured it out!!!!!!!" and she did. All by herself, she figured the problem...there was no problem, it WAS correct. I followed her instructions (those ends would become triangles that needed to be trimmed off) and it worked beautifully!! EQ would not have figured that out! They made a file and put Crispy's "fix" in it, in case someone else has that problem...if you are going to set a quilt on point and have a problem, call Crispy! I can not thank her enough for all the help she gave freely. Poor girl got a few grey hairs in the process, I am sure!

Round 2, which was putting all the blocks and sashing together, was not without problems. MY own problems...such as putting one entire half of the quilt together with NO problems and then forgetting that the other half needs to be assembled in the reverse order (which I did not do)...That meant frogging (rip it, rip it!) one 66 inch sashing strip and one 40 inch sashing strip along with 4 setting triangle units. Most of this took place from midnight til 1 am. Then getting so close to the end...you are actually DONE...only to realize that last 92 inch sashing strip that holds those 2 halves together was sewn 90% of the way with an empty bobbin!! It took 30 minutes to pin that strip just right, and another 30 to re-pin it!!!Seams. So many seams. This quilt went from less than 400 pieces to 1144 pieces and now it holds 1220 pieces with the sashing and pieced triangles added.Nothing that is worth something comes easily. I am proud of all the successes in this journey and grateful for all the pitfalls that taught me so many valuable lessons.

So what does Basket Case look like as a flimsey??? Get ready.....

Here it comes........

Are you holding your breath???

Ok, Ok.....drum roll please.......

TA DA!!!!!!!