A Gorgeous Custom Quilting Job by Sheila Van Der Linden

This quilt appealed to me right from the get go.

I loved the colors and big spaces. Gerda, the lady who pieced it, made this for herself so when we discussed options I gave her many choices. All though everything in me screamed “please let me do custom quilting!”, I gave her prices for edge to edge and pantographs as well as a price for custom. She decided that since she has been waiting for this it was worth paying custom. I nearly cheered! Using chalk I drew some ideas in some of the spaces, ribbon candy in the purple strips, feathers in the big orange triangles, and continuous curves in the smaller triangles. She liked everything I drew so we were on the same page. Its nice when you and your customer click like that. As a quilter you instantly feel a connection with the customer and the job becomes personal. I drew a grid on the outer border and that was the only thing she was not sure of. When I had the quilt on the frame I decided to just do straight lines on the outer border. I knew the quilt would be busy and this seemed a quiet and elegant design to frame it all. It’s a tiny floral so I thought the tiny stripes suited the fabric as well. This truly was a joy to quilt. I love knowing that Gerda will be putting this on her own bed, and though it is far from perfect, I am pleased with how it all turned out.