Banana Leaves Quilt by Elizabeth Hartman
I have a major backlog of projects from the Fat Quarter Shop’s Sew Sampler boxes. In February I went through all of my projects, organized, and cataloged them. Shortly before that, I found out my co-worker was having a baby. I knew just the pattern I was going to make, Banana Leaves by Elizabeth Hartman. This pattern uses Essex Linen and Adventure by Elizabeth Hartman and was featured in the October 2019 Sew Sampler box.
This wasn’t my first Elizabeth Hartman pattern. I love her patterns, even though many of them require many different cuts. I utilized my Alphabities and scrap paper with labels to help keep track of the different pieces.
You can see my Stripology XL ruler below my pieces. As an aside to this post, I just have to let you know how amazing this ruler is. Cutting has always been stressful for me. I want to make sure I’m getting perfect cuts, and they seem like they’re always just a hair off. That hasn’t happened since I’ve started using this ruler, and SO FAST!
Once I actually sat down and got to sewing, this pattern came together very quickly. I did a lot of it with chain piecing and grouped the leaves by letter. I finished one letter and moved onto the next. Some of my finished block sizes were off a smidge, mostly because sometimes my piecing isn’t as accurate as I would like. Either I move the fabric slightly, or my presser foot pushes the top fabric so it’s off just a touch. I’ve looked everywhere and it doesn’t look like my machine has an option to adjust the presser foot pressure.
I had big plans for quilting this one, and then I had a feeling co-worker’s baby was going to make his appearance sooner than expected, so I wanted to get it done. I went with simple zig zags with my walking foot. I love the way that the Essex Linen washes. I’ve used it before in other Elizabeth Hartman patterns and it becomes so incredibly soft. Someday I’ll make a quilt for myself with it and keep it. If I had been planning better, I might’ve put some thought into making sure that my lemurs were always right side up, but I’m okay with half of them being upside down.
This was the first time I’ve done a pieced backing and I really love the way it looks. I used the scraps from the leaves and randomly added them to either side of the label I printed. It was very freeform as I was creating it. Thanks to the pieced backing and the fact that I was a little skimpy with the extra fabric around the edge before quilting, I have quite a bit of the backing fabric left, but thankfully my scraps are minimal. I always feel guilty leaving scraps. I know I won’t go back to them and then they just end up cluttering my space.
Overall, I’m super pleased with the finished product. I hope the new baby is also pleased!
