Well I said that I needed to get cracking on these quilts, so I’m happy to say that I have one finished. It went even faster than I thought it would…probably because I haven’t made a quilt since at least April and I’ve missed doing all the steps to create a finished piece…not just a block or a row. This quilt was made for a friend who wants to give it to another friend and hoping that they are both happy with it! Neither had any input in it, so I’m always a little nervous in the end. But I like it, so I can at least be content with that.
I used many of my favorite fabrics in this and I’m happy to say that I had all the fabrics in my stash! Woohoo! It’s always good to do a complete project with the supplies that you already have. I’ve been wanting to a strip quilt like this for a long time, so I took advantage of the carte blanche that I had been given to design this quilt to use this technique. I love the simplicity that quilts like these have, but of course color, pattern and placement is just as crucial in a quilt like this as other more complicated pieced ones. As always, one of my favorite steps was laying out the different strips and seeing it all come together.
I used lots of different blues for subtle changes and some bright greens for contrast. The navy and brown solids help give some weight to the pattern and provide a break for the eye from the other patterned fabrics. And what’s a quilt without some polka dots?! I think that I could put a polka dot in everything that I make and be happy!
I did an echo quilting of the stripped pattern because I love the simplicity of the look and feel that it suits a baby boy better than some fussier quilting options. And for the backing, I had the perfect blue fabric with little white stars that was just begging to go in a nursery somewhere. It’s actually a decorator fabric, so it was 60″ wide which makes life a little simpler when basting together the layers of the quilt!
The binding I pieced together from left over strips from the top of the quilt. I had to cut them down a bit and then make one large strip of them all, but I was happy to use up all the fabric that I had cut to finish up this quilt. Woohoo! Always good to end up with the perfect amount of fabric. That so rarely happens to me. 😉 And as always I hand stitched the binding closed for a pretty and perfect look from both sides. It is a great way to finish up a quilt with some peaceful sitting in front of the tv and hand stitching. It never fails to make me very content.
Well, there are at least two more baby quilts that I’m going to try to get done in the near future. I’ve ordered the fabric for the Amy Butler love quilt and I can’t wait to see those fabrics in person. I’ve got the design picked out for that quilt already and I’ll give you previews as I work on that. And I still need to make the baby quilt for my own little one. That one will probably be the most work. Agh! And I have about 3.5 weeks to do all this. Hopefully all my sewing projects with go as smoothly as this quilt did.
It's gorgeous!
I agree, it is gorogeous and gives me such a good idea what to make next – thanks for the inspiration.
Hi there,
I absolutely love this quilt and wonder if you followed a pattern? If so, can you tell me where to find it?
Thank you!
anne_charboneau@yahoo.com
Fantastic!