Finally finished!

This is embarrassing to admit, but I finally finished this denim rag quilt Wednesday night, but I actually started it 3 or 4 years ago. With my mom's encouragement, I had recycled some jeans I had by cutting them into 8" blocks. I also had gotten flannel backing and cut those blocks out as well. That is as far as I ever got. Since then, it has just been sitting in my sewing room cabinet stuffed in a Walmart sack, just waiting for me to get the urge to actually assemble it.

I am going to credit Denise with giving me the gumption to get it out and work on it. Last weekend, Denise and I had gone to JoAnn's Fabrics together to pick out material for a quilt that she is going to be making. Looking at all the fabric made me feel guilty to remember my quilt blocks that were already pre-cut and ready to go and still stuffed in a sack. Let me also confess that I have never done something like this before. My grandma Nita was a wonderful quilter and I think she set the bar so high I was intimidated.

My wonderful friend, Lori, is a quilter. A few weeks ago, I admitted to her that I had cut quilt blocks years ago for a rag quilt but didn't really know how to get started. Lori said, "Oh, rag quilts are so easy!" Hummm... maybe easy for her, but I need directions to follow (I am a tried and true recipe follower). I Googled "denim rag quilt" and found some straight forward instructions and what do you know... Lori was right... it was easy!

I had some problems... I wanted my lap quilt to be two rows wider and one row longer, but apparently, when I cut my flannel backing blocks all those years ago, I had planned for a smaller quilt. So... I had to revise and go with the blocks that I had since I didn't have any more fabric. I also got major hand cramps snipping all the seams. In fact, that is what took the longest time. I sat in front of the TV and snipped and snipped for 2 1/2 hours. I only washed it once, so it should get a little more "fringy" in future washings.

THE MAIN THING IS THAT I FINISHED IT! I am not normally a procrastinator, but I am a total planner (with perfectionist tendencies) and since I never had instructions, I really think that is what held me back. Now I have something else I can do with my Ragamuffin daughter's torn up jeans!