A Finish: Sockeye Run

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!STATSSize – 61" x 42"Number of blocks – N/ATime to make – Around 25 hours.Fabric – All sorts; grunge, some metallic cottons for the eye, scales and teeth, etcBinding 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 HeirloomQuilting- Scales and directional lines for realism.