Usually these calls scare me (not like OMG shark scare, more like oh boy, what have I gotten myself into scare) because deep inside I really want to help, but when the brain hears those words the alarm sounds, DANGER, DANGER.... it knows almost immediately that it is going to be something trying, possibly extremely difficult, and well, unsure. Well, this is not always the case, as Sally's quilt was almost entirely quilted, all that was required of me was to complete two full borders and two half borders, matching the hand quilting as best I could, and then to remove the basting stitches. Okay, sounds easy enough.
Here's what was brought to me:
That is some crazy rolled-up binding huh? I don't know the entire story of this quilt - whether the shop left them hanging instruction-wise on how to finish a quilt, whether they just didn't go back, or if that was just a guess on how to finish the edge. Anyway, my work on this quilt just grew a bit, because there was no way I could or would leave that edge treatment. I undid all those stitches and here is how much fabric and batting was rolled up in there, it was about 10-12 inches on all sides!
And there was some critter damaged from being stored so long, that need to be patched up so I appliqued a small piece of the backing to cover it. Sorry about that, I took a picture of the critter damage, but not of the applique piece covering it (I know, dumb),
So after some careful stitching to match the hand stitches as close as possible and a few days worth of hand binding, here's what I accomplished:
and here is the amount of fabric and batting that is no longer rolled up in the binding -- that's a lot!
Sally came and picked up her "antique" quilt and was super pleased. And I was pleased that I could help finished her quilt. It waited a very long time to be born!
So just remember, if you find an old monstrosity of a quilt rolled up in the corner of an attic or way in the back of a closet and think it can't be helped - it most likely can!