Irish Plaid Quilt

I started this quilt more than a few years ago.  The pattern was printed 8 years ago and I know I did most of the piecing for it at a retreat 4 years ago.  When I showed it to my son after the retreat, he wasn't as enthused about it as when he picked the pattern and fabrics, so it was put to the side. This past September, his partner asked for a quilt for Christmas without any specific pattern in mind but told me her favourite colour was green.  Well, I showed them the completed centre of the quilt and it was decided I would finish it for them for Christmas.  Here is the centre of the quilt and one border:

I am usually not a "pinner" but for these borders, all the matches to continue the design did not nest but crossed each other so I ended up pinning almost every inch:

It took me almost as long to make and attach the borders as it had taken me to make and sew together the quilt centre.  I would have liked to bind it using the darker green, but did not have enough fabric left and bound it with the medium green which in the end I think looks nicer as it just looks like the border goes right to the edge of the quilt:

Here is a view of the back with the sun shining through:

I used a spare block as a quilt label (last names blocked for privacy):

Since the name of the quilt pattern was "Irish Plaid" I decided to quilt it with shamrocks and used a pantograph called Shamrocks Border by Deb Geissler and Digi-Tech.  I was partway through quilting when I was thinking about shamrocks and four leaf clovers and them being lucky and started laughing when I thought about the quilt being lucky etc....

Here is a picture of my son Bryan and his partner Catherine holding up the quilt Christmas morning:

And later my son sent me a picture of it on their bed:

I got the pattern from "Quilter's Cache", however I did not paper piece it, but I did strip piece parts of it.  (http://www.quilterscache.com/I/IrishPlaidBlock.html)

I am glad that this quilt went from being put aside to being wanted again and getting an old UFO (unfinished object) out of my sewing room and being used!  Wasn't it lucky that Catherine's favourite colour was green?

Linking to Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday http://crazymomquilts.blogspot.ca/2017/12/maine-socks-and-stash-organization.html