The Lab

 Dear Readers,

A few years ago, I saw a pattern called Potions by Flying Parrot Quilts.  When I saw it, I immediately thought of my school bestie, Rochelle who taught Chemistry and Physics.  Well life went on and earlier this year, Rochelle was contemplating retirement, so I figured I better get it together and make that quilt, so I bought the background fabric and shelf fabric and kitted up all the test tubes, flasks and beakers.  When I went to Sue's for craft week in January,  I made about 6-8 test tubes.  When I got home, I quilted up the quilt top we had made for Sue's new grand and also finished a mini-quilt.  Once I got those done, I picked back up on The Lab.   I finished the top and got the back ready, but then was out of town for 3 different trips and I was having trouble wrapping my brain around how to quilt it.  

I knew immediately that I was going to do some kind of woodgrain on the shelves.  So then I watched how Angela Walters quilted Tula Pink's quilt where she did vials of potions in a more random design.  That gave me some inspiration to get started.  While I am no Angela Walters, her quilting was definitely the inspiration for what I did.  Here is a picture of Angela with Tula's quilt.  

I just used scrap fabrics for the contents of the vials and I tried to do something a little different on each of those.  Here are some close ups of the quilting.  

I really pushed myself on the quilting.  I see lots of places to improve, but it was definitely a step forward.  

I put Chemisty fabric on the back with green strips because I knew Rochelle was not afraid of color.  So here is a picture of the back and the label.

zoom in to see the quilting.  The vials were done in white thread and the background in a light orange.  

I gave it to her last week, she was thrilled!  So fun!

Sew on,

Terry