Cold Comfort

by Lesley Thomas
(Co. Sligo, Ireland)

I was inspired by a wall hanging in Australian Patchwork and Quilting magazine in late 1998 or 1999. It had three snowflakes that I adapted, and I enjoyed making them so much, I kept going, designing all the rest myself (a total of 42) The blocks are 12 in. finished, I tacked/basted all around each snowflake, needle turned them onto the background, then hand quilted around each one at the end, so I have been round each one three times!

I machine pieced the blocks and borders together but all the applique is hand done, as is all the quilting. I was averaging one block a week during the last few months of 1999, and then my marriage broke up (That is where the name of the quilt comes from), and I moved from the UK to Ireland. I kept going with the blocks, managed to make all the icicles for the border, but then got stalled with the quilting.

I had intended to machine quilt, and started with an all over design, but didn't like it, so I unpicked it all, and began to hand quilt. Between those two versions of quilting were a few years as I lost heart in it for a while. Once I made the decision to unpick the machine quilting, work went better, and I finished it about 7 years after I began.

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