My Garden Quilt

I did it!  It's finally finished!  

I have always loved the Primitive Garden quilt by Primitive Gatherings, so when my friend, Nancy, gave me the pattern for my birthday, there really was no excuse not to make it!  But we all know how that goes - a million other things needed to be done first.  Finally, in May of 2016, I started a Facebook Group, where we encouraged each other to keep going on this quilt.  If it weren't for that, I probably wouldn't have even started this quilt.  But...since I was the admin of the group, I had to have my block finished each month! It was a fun group, lots of people sewed along, some finished and some are still working on it.  The group is still going now if you would like to join, follow the link - you have to be approved - be sure to answer the questions.  I'm still one of the admins, but someone else is doing all of the work now!

I made a lot of changes to the original pattern to make it my own.  Here is the original...

You can see all of the changes that I made - here are the details, with pictures below.

The cat on the left side represents our five outside kitties.  

I replaced the garden hose on the right with a United States flag. This flag was designed by a member of the Facebook group.  She also was kind enough to post a layout of how to put this all together, because that is not included in the pattern.

The cats in the center are our indoor cats (at the time that I started this quilt), Ozzie and Callie. They replaced garden tools and gloves.  I like how Ozzie's tail hangs down into the sashing.

I replaced the small center block (potted plant and seed packets) with a bee skep and flowers, and added bees all over the quilt because my husband raises bees.  Boomer hated the bees, as they chased him one day and I'm pretty sure he got stung on his butt, hence the bee placement!  The bee skep block was part of a pattern by The Little Red Hen.

The plaid wool for the center birdhouse was from a suit that belonged to my dad.  He used to wear that suit to church a lot (a long time ago!) and gave it to me one day.  I think he was going to get rid of it and Mom knew that I may have a use for it!  I add a little piece of it to a lot of my wool applique projects.

I didn't really care for the look of the Bible verse on the original, so on the bottom of the quilt I added extra sunflowers, pumpkins and our dogs (at the time) - Bailey and Boomer. I wanted Boomer to be with the strawberries because he used to "help" me pick berries.  When he was a puppy he made it very interesting - constantly jumping around in the patch.  I used to stick strawberries in his mouth (he liked them!), or throw them so he would chase them so I could pick a few more.  When he got out of puppy-stage he was a little easier to pick with.  He always came and hung out with me when I picked them.  Something ate all of our berries this year (probably because Boomer wasn't here to chase them away), but every time I went to check the patch, out of habit, I always looked to see if he was coming.  I miss him!

When my dad passed away in January, my quilting friends, Jill, Vicki, Becky & Kim, gave me a tree to plant in our yard in his memory.  It is replicated above Boomer.

It took a long time for me to finish this, but I sure am glad that I did!  I should also mention that as usual I had all of the blocks finished - including all of the sashing pieces, but my Aunt Nancy sewed it all together for me.  My planning wasn't perfect and there was a big space above Boomer's head that I couldn't decide what to do with, so I put it all away for another year or so (sheesh!!).  One day I saw some pictures that Sharon Lacey posted on Instagram of a version of this quilt.  She had done the machine quilting on it, and we started chatting back and forth.  She agreed to quilt mine when I finished it, and that was just the push I needed.  It was just crazy to have it sitting in the closet with all that work in it and that close to being done!  When my husband suggested adding Dad's memory tree, I knew that was the answer!  PERFECT!  

Here are some close-ups - the pictures are kind of washed out, but you get the idea!  This was before adding the binding - I'm hand stitching it down now.

Here are some pictures that Sharon took while she was quilting it - she did a beautiful job - I just love it.

This quilt truly is a labor of love by family, friends and me!