Every so often you make a quilt that just screams for a frame. Yes, you could put a sleeve on it, but you know in your heart that it would look better framed.
SO….a few weeks ago I came across a tutorial for how to frame your quilt. I would LOVE to give credit to the author but I honestly cannot remember where I saw it. Did I read it? Did I watch it? Did someone tell me about it??? ARGH….I just cant remember. (Note: last night I dreamed that I lost my car and couldn’t remember where I had left it. When I woke, I was dreaming that I was walking down a very busy street, pushing the panic button on my key and hoping that I would find my car). GREAT….I am forgetful in my dreams….not a good sign!!!
OK….on with the tutorial. Here are the steps used to frame a small quilt……
The first step is to center the quilt on the BACK of the matting. I did this by first gridding the back……
and then placing the quilt, FACE SIDE DOWN on the mat……
Draw around the outside of the quilt……
Now, take an awl and punch a hole just inside the drawn outline (about 1/4 of an inch inside the line). Place one punch at each corner and then one every 2 inches…..
Turn the mat over and place your quilt over the punched holes.
Take a needle and thread and, coming from the back, draw the needle up thru one of the holes (start with a hole NEXT TO the corner)……
Catch a small bit of the backing fabric on the needle……
And return the needle back thru the same hole……
If you leave the corner for last, it makes the final stitch easier to make since you can fold back the quilt.
As added protection, I ran a piece of masking tape over the stitching line…..
And, voila……here is the framed piece.
I really like that this method doesn’t interfere with the integrity of the quilt and that I could easily change my mind and remove it from the mat, put on a sleeve and hang it as a quilt.
As my final step, I place masking tape over the edges of the glass and am planning to us this to try some mono printing in the future!!!!
