The TEST Hammock - Fancy Fabric Crazy Quilting

Did I say Crazy Quilt?  

This was just plain insanity.  And, I threw this little hammock together in about an hour.  Wowzers.  This may just be my solution for profitability for my custom hammocks.  This was fast and beautiful.  Most of my custom hammocks take hours to make.  But, this one was done in less than an hour.  Giggles and its shiny.

I have a potential customer who wants a really snazzy hammock for her hamster.  Zebra print, brocade, and bright colors.  Her hamster reminds me of Lady Gaga.  Anyways, this hammock requires a bit of testing.  First, who in her right mind makes a hammock out of brocade.  Well, me, of course.  But, first, it's important to know whether my brocade fabric will survive the washing machine.  So, I washed the dryclean only fabric and found out that ..... IT SURVIVED, but it shrinks like crazy.

So, the brocade is feasible, well, hopefully feasible.

I'd been throwing around ideas for the hammock but nothing was catching my fancy.  Here's my initial plan which has been shredded and thrown out the window.

By the way, I haven't edited any of my photos today.  I've just tossed them up on the blog pretty much in the same fashion that I made the test hammock.

I guess, I'd been thinking crazy quilt because brocade goes with crazy quilt, and my customer's hamster is pretty much loco, too.  But, there was no way I was going to hand stitch a crazy quilt.  

Then, today, I stumbled across this Quilt-as-you-go Improv Bag  And, eureka, a plan was hatched or tossed together.

 Here's my fleece square aka backing.  Since I'm making a hammock, this is actually going to be the back of the hammock.

 Here's my first strip of brocade sewn down.  I didn't even iron it.  This is totally against my rules.  Then, again I was just cutting out these strips freehand.  OOOOOOooooo.  I was breaking all of the rules.

Then, I sewed on the second strip.  It was about here that it dawned on me that I should have paid more attention to the instructions.  But, I was throwing all of the rules out the window.

 So, I had to do a bit of scrambling to figure out how to fix my creation, but it wasn't too hard.  I should remember that following instructions makes things easier.  The trick is that you want each subsequent piece to be larger than the last piece so that you can always cover your last bit of stitching with your next scrap of fabric.

  Here's the "quilted" square.

 Then, a bit of trimming.

 And, I attached bias binding.  I still need to refine my binding technique as the corners are um... not perfect and I want a better finish to the ends, but I was actually pleased with both the front and back for the stitching that attached the binding.

Daryl, here, has already started the rat durability test.