Progress on the Hawaiian shirt quilt has sped up over Christmas and the New Year, despite a severe case of man flu. The top is now almost finished and I just need to insert a few more portholes.

Portholes are a great way of doing circles in a kind of reverse applique way. They look really sharp and if you are patient enough then you can do them in really small circles which I think looks very effective.

For this quilt I wanted to contrast the crisp clean edge of the porthole against the more random background.

This quilt is going to be my entry for this years Festival of Quilts at the NEC. I've tried to take on board the feedback from last years judges comments and focus on a number of things;

1. More quilting, last year I just did some in the ditch quilting which to be fair was a bit basic, so this year I've tried to do some more free motion quilting which hopefully has enhanced my quilt, we'll see what the feedback is....

2. Better quality of finish, last year my binding was fairly ordinary, this year I've hand bound my quilt and have vastly improved my corners!

3. Tried to use more negative space through the inclusion of several portholes.

#quilt #modernpatchwork #freemotionquilting #quilting