This quilt seemed to take a long time to finish, but I think it was mainly because I had to wait for some background fabric to arrive in the middle of assembling the top.  It was also tricky to lay out.  At one point I sewed a couple of blocks in wrong and had to fix them, so I asked the Twilters to look at it before I sandwiched it, just to be sure.  Sometimes you’re just too close to a project.

I found this design at Sew Excited Quilts when Jackie was working with her strings.  She worked out all of these great layouts, and when I saw the one with the stars, I knew it was what I wanted for this Quilt of Valor.  I calculate that my quilt  56″ x 81″) has 1120 pieces of fabric in it!  This has, finally, made a bit of a dent in my strings.

My stash has reached the point where I no longer have large backing pieces in every color, so I purchased this backing fabric on sale from Fabric Shack.  I look the water color-like print!

I used white Bottom Line to stitch in the ditch and for all the stippling.  I used a heavy Coats and Clark variegated thread for the stars and the hearts.  I have mixed feelings about the way the stars turned out on the white areas.  I really like tone-on-tone quilting, where the shadows do the work, but I also like pretty thread.  These do add interest.  What do you think?

I’m linking up to Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.