This project is actually a very quick one so I apologize for taking so long. I decided that I wanted the background to be the same as my Missouri crazy quilt so I ordered another yard of fabric from Missouri Star Quilt Co. Hamilton, Missouri is probably only an hour and a half away but that translates to 4 days with the post office so that was part of my delay.
After you get all the states pieced together, it’s time to take the paper off the back. Here’s where it helps if you used a very small stitch length because you were basically perforating the paper. Rip that stuff off and then it’s time to applique the whole thing to some background fabric. I used 1 yard of background fabric and had plenty of room.
Applique is not my favorite thing and I’m not very good at it. I’ve learned that it works best for me if I stick the piece I’m appliqueing to the background fabric. It just makes it easier if everything isn’t moving around. Here’s the sticky stuff I used. I ironed it onto the backside of my map, then removed the paper and placed it where I wanted it on my background fabric. It made things a little crunchy which I did not experience with my Missouri quilt. I must’ve used something else but this was all I could find locally and it worked.
Once everything was stuck down, I used a special stitch on my sewing machine and appliqued the map. After that, I trimmed the piece up with my largest square ruler so it was the size I wanted. Then I made my quilt “sandwich” with batting and backing and quilted the map area using fun stitches on my machine and different colored threads. I quilted the outside blue background with a simple stipple pattern. Like my other crazy quilt, I pieced lots of fabrics together for the binding. The splash of color works well although you can’t really see in this picture.
I keep thinking it would be fun to embellish the quilt with buttons and things to show the places we’ve lived, where the kids were born, where we got married. I might actually get around to doing that someday.
I’m not sure what’s next – the world? A patchwork planet would be awesome!