Signed, Sealed, Delivered

I'm happy to say this quilt is in Toronto and waiting for our new grandson who should put in an appearance anytime between now and early March.

I learned a lot on this quilt and for the most part -- it was fun.  Make a mistake?  Just make it work. No ripping.  Just changing direction when something didn't go as planned.

I quilted with a light gray thread and let me tell you -- there is no place to hide when you are quilting solids with semi-straight lines.  No pattern in the fabric to hide your boo-boos.  No busy pieced blocks to hide your "oops".  No forgiving backing that hides your goofs. They are out there for everyone to see.

I know this is a bit unorthodox for a baby quilt -- and I had no idea how it would be received. Interestingly, when we got home, I began to get lots of questions about how I had quilted it as they looked more and more closely. I did lots of starts and stops and burying thread so anytime I "hit" a tree, I stopped, tied off, and restarted somewhere else.  Once I sent this picture of the quilt on Lola, our son understood -- and appreciated the effort even more.

So, I'm looking forward to meeting Rex Webb Steve (our grandson's choice of names for his little brother) in a month or two and seeing that little guy on his birch tree quilt.

I hope you are quilting for someone you love -- whether you've met them yet or not!

Jan

Planting a forest

Ever had an idea that seemed logical in your head and once you executed it - you weren't so sure?  That's what's going on here.

This started out as a version of crazy mom quilts "birch trees".  I love this pattern and bought it with the intent of making it for our new grandson who is to put in an appearance in early March.  I started piecing the brightly colored birches - I studied her version - I pondered lights and darks.  And then it took a right turn.

And I began to wonder if I could do more realistic birch trees.  And would that make sense for a baby quilt?  So I began to do a search on Pinterest and Google and came up with a beautiful and sophisticated wall hanging from tallgrass prairie studio's "night forest".   Isn't this lovely?  And I loved the contrast of lights and darks and all the different fabrics she used.

I still wasn't sure but I was intrigued and decided to try it.  It's for family, after all, and if it's a little too "out there" or non-traditional, they won't have trouble telling me.  So I started and had no idea what I was doing.  I went through my strings; I pulled some pre cut strips from my bins; and I dug into my strips from men's shirts.

I had forgotten how much I Iike improvisational piecing.  I just put away the ruler and started cutting.  It went together quickly and when I did something I didn't intend to -- I just made it work.  This is what the first version looked like when I added strips.  The first image is the finished top and there was some evolution in design -- but not a lot. No pinning!  Just cut, sew, and repeat.

This required me to stop working on the Quiltville mystery for a few days but I'm hoping to get caught back up while I ponder how to quilt this.  I love the negative space but I've learned that dense quilting on a baby quilt takes away any "drape" until it's been washed a number of times.  So, rather than create a "stiff" quilt for "Rex Webb Steve" (the name our grandson has chosen -- we're not monogramming anything just yet!), I'll restrain myself and not over quilt it.

I hope you are finding time to "create" and improvise occasionally and enjoy the process! Looking forward to a wonderful 2015 and more creativity!

Jan