My sister’s been having a clear out which ended up being great news for me.

I can’t remember how many years ago it was, but she started to do patchwork at a class which resulted in a fabulous first quilt. She was very enthusiastic about starting another one so we went to the fabric shop together to choose lots of blues for her solo adventure. The pattern had already been chosen, as had the method of construction. It was going to be a Trip Around the World quilt made using the tube method. All went well initially but her enthusiasm soon waned and that was the last I heard of any quilt progress. Unfortunately it had made its way into the cupboard to be forgotten. Every now and again, I’d ask her when she was going to get the quilt bits out of the bag and have another go. She kept saying it would get done one day. It didn’t. Eventually, I offered to finish it for her. Those fabrics were pricey and far too good to just sit in a cupboard. I was convinced she’d thrown it all in the bin! However, I was so pleased when she handed me the bag just after Christmas.

There were lots of bits.

Some tubes were already split, some were still stitched together. There was a pile of uncut fabric plus three pieced rectangles. The dark photos were all taken in poor electric light by the way 😦

The top two rectangles are exactly the same if one is rotated 180 degrees. The bottom one is completely different in both size and colour. I couldn’t make head nor tail of the pattern so I ditched it. Then it was just a case of solving the puzzle of all the bits. The good thing was that my sister had pressed all the seams correctly and her piecing was perfect so far.

I eventually got to here…

…but there was still loads of fabric left so I joined more strips and made it wider.

I chose a white on white fabric for the backing and binding…

…and kept the quilting simple.

Not a brilliant photo but you’ll get the idea. It turned out to be a good sized single to flop over the sides of the bed or it would make a nice double topper.

My sister loves it but she no longer has a colour scheme in any room to match. So it’s mine! That’s the good news 🙂 I’ve got a single bedroom with white walls and it works a treat in there. However, I couldn’t stop there because there was still plenty of fabric left.

 I made a quilted pillow sham.

I should have made more effort with the photography but here’s the finish!

I think it would have been so much quicker to start this one from scratch but my sister had spent a lot of time cutting and piecing and I had loads of fun sorting out the puzzle.

Have you ever finished something that someone else had started? How did it turn out?