I designed this Quilt after we came back from the Okanagan Valley at the end of the summer. Every four years, there is a “dominant run”, where the sockeye salmon that swim upstream are expected to be in their thousands and effectively turn the streams and rivers red. 2018 was a dominant run year! More information on the Salmon Run can be found HERE.

Anyway, we were a little early, but we saw a few salmon that had made their way upstream for spawning at the Tsútswecw Provincial Park (pronounced Choo-chwek) before we headed back home.

We stopped in lots of quilt shops out that way, and I collected up some of the fabrics used in this quilt from those local stores.

It was intended to be the largest pictorial quilt that I’ve made, but I am inspired by what Timna Tarr does – she has a set square size for her pictorials that makes her pieces hang amazingly when they’re all together, rather than all higgeldy-piggeldy like mine. So this may be my last larger quilt. I also struggle to quilt them without stitching first, and have to reglue when they’re larger.

There’s lots of dense quilting within the fish, and then it gets looser for the water. I need to get better at loose quilting as it looks like there are tucks and puckers when they’re not there. I am thinking spray basting as well as pinning might be a good idea!

This is a Finish Along Finish!

STATS
Size – 61″ x 42″
Number of blocks – N/A
Time to make – Around 25 hours.
Fabric – All sorts; grunge, some metallic cottons for the eye, scales and teeth, etc
Binding Fabric – Heavier weight Ikea fabric, turned to the back as a facing.
Threads – A mixture of 40wt Aurifil, 40 wt Isacord, depending on colours available.
Batting – 80/20 Hobbs Heirloom
Quilting- Scales and directional lines for realism.