The Patience of Job

 No, I don't really have the patience of Job, BUT I have learned to work on my quilts until I'm satisfied with the result--EVEN if it means taking stitches out and starting over again.  After all, I'm the one who needs to be pleased with the end result.
Well, I've been work on a quilt for at least 5 months now and it has more applique than any quilt I've ever done before.  I've been pretty happy with how things have been going with it, but I've had my eye on the center for quite some time .  The other night I decided that I was going to have to bite the bullet and try to fix it.  I don't know if you can tell from this picture, but there is a definite bulge there (the black piece of fabric is merely there for me to get the feeling of a piece of black applique in the cente)r.

 So, when I got into my studio yesterday morning, I got out the sharpest little scissors that I own and started cutting away the red center--and this was definitely with heart in hand.  You can see here the quilt top after I had finished cutting.  I then took out all of the satin stitching that had held the layers together.

 The next step was to lay the quilt over a large piece of fabric that had been taped down to keep it immobile.  After I did that, I fused all of the newly cut edges to the large piece of fabric.








I then CAREFULLY took the quilt top to the sewing machine and basted around all of the raw edges.  Once this was completed, I satin-stitched around the entire piece.  And, wonder of wonders, the quilt now lays flat and I'm back on course.

And this is where I am now.  Still a long way to go but feeling a lot better.  At present, it measures about 6' x 6" but will  be larger when finished.
Do I know why the center bulged?  Not really.  I used good stabilizer on the flowers and leaves but I suspect that the AMOUNT of stitching had something to do with it.
So, no, I definitely don't have the patience of Job and it is distressing when a problem this big occurs on a creative project.  But one thing that I find very fulfilling in the entire process is the "figuring out"--the search for a solution.  I am a firm believer in the lemonade theory and, thankfully, I had a large supply of lemonade made from all of the lemons in my life.