And finally for today a little bit of the muscial inspiration...

Here's the song I have been listening to whilst working really hard....I believe you will all agree it is a T.U.N.E.

And now to make it life size...

Well, this was the hard bit!

I has initally decided to make the quilt the same size as a double duvet, but having measures the wadding I have to make the quilt (thanks Jess!), it is not quite wide enough, so instead I have decided on a comfort blanket sizes creation, approximately 5ft long and 4ft wide.

So now I had to transfer my pattern from A4 to the size of the quilt. (No easy task!) I acquired some freezer paper from my lovely friend Emily to make the pattern with. I stuck 3 strips of it side by side to make it right width of the blanket and then cut it to length.

Now I have to turn it over and draw by hand the design on a much bigger scale. The countries have had to be drawn geometrically shaped to make the sewing of country borders a little easier. After a few rubbings out and shouts of "No Zimbabwe, you'r not that shape!" or "Stop moving Mali!" I think I got it right....

 

Then I had to number the countries so I could refer back to my image afterwards and sew the countries together in the right order. I have, esentially made myself a 'sew by numbers' pattern and I am really proud of myself! :) 

The Quilt Pattern Takes Shape....

So I had a few ideas on the design for my quilt and narrowed it down to these two:

I decided on the first design, as I thought it was more identifiable as an African quilt with an image of Africa on it, and also to be made out of African fabrics makes it twice as African. 

I also plan to choose the fabrics for each country to contrast with the one next to it and hope it makes a really striking design....we shall see!

More fabrics...

So I acquired some more fabrics with the help of the lovely Deborah Cook. 

I found a lovely Ghanian lady in the fish market in Birmingham who sells African fabrics and clothing. I paid her a very reasonable sum for some fabric and offcuts and came home a very happy girl! 

Here are a few images of the fabrics: