View from the Cabin

View from the Cabin, 2006

This hangs in our living room and I love this quilt!   I made this in 2006 as a wedding gift to my husband, Brandon (although I didn't actually finish it until Nov. that year -- we were married in July).  This is my own design, depicting the view from our cabin at Jack's Lake in Canada.  That is me and Brandon kayaking in the sunset.  The quilt is hand appliqued.  The trees, figures, paddles, and loon are all hand embroidered.  The clouds and water are hand quilted.  The only machine work was attaching the borders and part of the binding.  This quilt is approximately 23" x 22".

This is the actual view from our cabin.

That is a loon in the distance.  There are many loons at Jack Lake and they can often be seen alone or in pairs bobbing on the lake's surface looking for fish.  Then they disappear for a while and pop back up in a different spot.

This came out a little blurry, but here is a close-up of the label at the bottom.  This is done with a special permanent fabric marker.  Don't ask me why I made the label so wide.  I have no idea.  And, in case you are wondering, Apsley is in central Ontario in the Kawartha Lakes Region.  It's an 8 - 9 hour drive from CT depending on whether or not we're towing the boat.

Here is a close-up of the two figures kayaking.  Yes, our kayaks are actually light and dark blue.  I've always felt that Brandon's figure and paddle looks a little messed up, but it doesn't look as bad from a distance.  I embroidered the figures freehand (no picture or pattern), so I guess I shouldn't be too hard on myself!

Here's a close-up of some trees and the loon.  You can also see the hand quilting that I did in the wave fabric.  The quilting really gives the water movement and motion.  I have to admit, though, that once I got started with this quilting (after I realized how long it was going to take and it was too late to go back) I had to ask myself "What were you thinking?" But once I finished it, well, I think it was worth it!

You can see the quilting a little better in this one.

Close-up of the embroidered trees. Conifers dominate the landscape at Jack Lake.  So, of course, I made all the trees conifers.  Plus, they are easier to freehand embroider!

This border fabric of conifers was perfect for this quilt!  I originally set out to find a wood-grain fabric, which I know exists, but could not for the life of me find in a store when I needed it!  I wanted it to look like a picture frame.  Instead, I found this tree fabric and thought it just might work.  It then became necessary to add the brownish stone-looking mini border because the green didn't look as good right next to the blue, and I needed to break it up a little.  I'm really pleased with how the borders came out on this.

And, finally, a close-up of the clouds.  This is a cloud fabric that I used.  I quilted around each cloud in the fabric to give them dimension.  After appliqueing the sun in place over the clouds, I cut out a few clouds from a scrap piece of fabric and appliqued it slightly over the sun to make it appear the sun is behind them.

Closer view of the sun applique and cloud quilting.

Here is what the water quilting looks like from the back.  You can also see the stone-like fabric I chose for the backing.  I thought it was fitting with the theme of this quilt.  A couple of years later, I used some leftovers of this fabric in my daughter Caroline's baby quilt (it is the back of a turtle in her quilt!).

View of the entire quilt from the back.