Apple Picnic Quilt

It's the last day of February and I am sliding in with the second UFO finish of the year. 

My goal for this quarter for the 2013 Finish-A-Long is to quilt one unfinished top per month.  I got this basted on Monday afternoon, but then work ramped up and all of a sudden it was the evening of the 27th.  Yikes! I needed to carve out some time to quilt and bind this baby.  I finished quilting it at about midnight, and then this morning I bound it (by machine, of course, are you kidding me).

I'm not a last-minute person.  I don't like waiting until the eleventh hour to do something, although sometimes it happens that way and I can deal.  Some people thrive on the adrenaline rush of an imminent deadline (and those people amaze me).  Mostly it just makes me cranky.

But I'm feeling good that I can check this one off the list.  It's throw quilt size, but I imagine it'd make a nice picnic quilt.  Like, three months from now.

I had some hesitation when I opened the sliding door to take pictures on the deck today.  The snow was drifted up against the screen door.  You can probably guess by now that I am so ready to flip the calendar page and say goodbye to yet another month of winter.

So these are "throw-snap-go" pictures.  I donned my snow boots and other paraphernalia, but it was still too cold for dilly-dallying.  It was sure a lot more fun to take pictures of the top last September!

Here's the pieced back.  The quilting won't win any prizes, but after it's washed and crinkly, it won't matter anyway.

The pattern is called Breathe.  I really like snail's trail quilts and know there are more in store for me in the future.  I challenged myself to use a funky vintage apple print I found at the (wait for it...) thrift store.

It reminds me of the place we used to pick apples, on the outskirts of town, called the "Apple Pick-Nic Nut Farm."  Not only were the apples amazing—some varieties the size of softballs—but the name was a lot fun to say.  The farm has been since sold and all the apple trees chopped (I know, sad).

Hey, you know what?  I think I'll name this quilt after that place, in memory of those fun apple-picking times—the Apple Picnic Nut Farm quilt!

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