Monday, August 8, 2011

Blocking and Finishing Underway



After completing the hand stitching, the next step is to block the quilt.

Blocking consists of pinning quilt to a padded surface with consistent tension across the entire quilt. The pinning removes any torsion that may have been established with the quilting.

I use yellow headed pins to do this and pin it down onto carpet. Once pinned, I thoroughly steam it with a steam iron held just over the surface about 1/2 inch until it is thoroughly moist throughout. Then it will need to dry for 2 days before removing the pins. At this point, the piece will have the low relief sculptural finish that I designed.


The next step is cutting it to size and putting on the bindings.

It gets exciting to be this close to the finish line!


Nancy