The Finished Baby Boy Quilt and Free-Cut Strips

The baby quilt is all done finally. It's bound, washed and even has a label! The binding was the last little detail to get figured out and luckily I had the perfect fabric waiting in the wings. On its own, it was an uninspiring piece of fabric, but for the purposes of this quilt? Just what was needed.

Grandsons baby quilt is done!

I struggled with this quilt all along. Mostly because baby quilts can be difficult for me these days. There's just no room for expanding on the original idea and that just feels a little suffocating! And it was a boy quilt so that feels even harder. As per usual, I gathered together fabrics from what was at hand. Then I went looking for more.

Simple quilting here in this area

I was able to use a couple fatquarters my mom gave me early this spring and also, managed to buy just a couple pieces that seemed necessary to convey the color palette my DIL wanted. When the quilt top stage was finally achieved, I have to admit to feelings of abject failure. Why oh why didn't I just keep going with the overall block theme and leave off the outside border inclusion? 

Want to know a secret? Because it was a very old fabric that I was quite determined to use up and this seemed like the best quilt opportunity ever. Huh. So muleheaded when I get an idea in my head. Was it worth it? Hmmm.... Ill let you decide.

Decided to add more quilting texture into the border 

Thankfully, after the quilting texture jumped into the quilt and the washing revealed the quilty goodness, I was able to stand back and view the quilt a little more kindly. Yes, it could have been better, but overall, it's a warm, boyish looking quilt. Goal accomplished. After all, a baby quilt doesn't have to be the best of all of our efforts. It just has to be sweet, cozy, cuddly looking and not too special to be used!

Crumpled and cozy looking

Bonus, my DIL seemed very, very happy with it! Gotta love that. Goes wonderfully well with the newly finished baby room decor of highland cows and little cowboys.*sigh  Also, what a relief to know that even though it was late by my standards, it was good timing for her.

A little bit of the back showing

In other news, our daughter gifted us with a trip to Alberta, Canada. We drove up to Banff {with her} from our home here in Washington. Very fast trip, but such a lovely drive and all the mountains and glacier fed lakes that we saw were just incredible. We were in awe! Wish we could have had more time to explore, but it was definitely a trip that we will treasure forever.

Lake Louise, Canada

I know this will make some of you uncomfortable, but we are actually quite poor at the moment. Which made the trip all the sweeter as it wasn't something we would have been able to do on our own! Though my husband is doing better now, he has had lots of sickness in the last several years with this past winter being the absolute worst. We really almost lost him and so our time together seems very precious. All the lost work, together with the poor economy, rising inflation etc. and we are just struggling financially. As I'm sure others are as well. I mean, have you noticed the price of groceries and fuel?

Got to start somewhere!

Which brings me to quilting. So very thankful for my totes of fabric. Even without buying a single piece of fabric, I can probably keep making quilt tops for at least a couple years. They might be 'interesting' color palettes, but then, that's my thing, right? No worries there. And then there is the bins of scrap fabric. Surely that could keep me occupied for another year or two? Ha! Not that I'm complaining. It is what it is.

The completed slabs of fabric strips for cross-cutting

I came home from the trip with an overwhelming need to get busy in the quilt room. Kind of like an ache in my heart just to play with fabric. I wandered around sort of aimless though, until finally making myself pick a project and sticking to it. Can't imagine why I landed on a project that featured so much blue, can you? 

Getting the baskets joined together

I free-cut strips until I had enough to make at least ten slabs of the mixed blue and violet fabrics. As always, it was tricky getting started, not knowing how exactly to set things up in order to not waste fabric. Eventually I decided that these final strip sets needed between two to three strips of blue for every addition of the violet ones. I know they are a little blendy looking in the blue sections, but that is by design. Hopefully this results in a calmer, cozier vibe for the baskets without competing too much for imminence.  

Each row of baskets will be slightly staggered if I can just figure out how to do the layout. Then there will be a section to the right with more of the dark brown fabric {no baskets at all}. This will be the 'background area' where I intend to cut out and applique a largish folky looking tree and perhaps a bird or two. It's all doodled onto a piece a paper, but putting it into fabric is wonderfully challenging as always....

Just Trying For Some Forward Momentum

Just trying to finish up the quilt top for the improv. quilt meetings. My colors are a little more blendy than most of the others in the class, but you know me, always trying to play with color. Sometimes it turns out wonderfully and others, not so much. This feels like a bit of both. Still on the fence about adding an applique centerpiece though. Some days I fiercely want to. Other days I just want to move on.

Starting to sew the rows together!

I left the project stacked up in the single strips for awhile. Just seemed like more effort than I wanted to expend when it came to cutting them all the same length. Then, once I made the time, it wasn't that big a deal. Isn't that usually the case? Thankfully I had a huge chunk of quiet time when it came to laying them out on the floor and figuring out where all the cuts needed to go. So much easier to do that part without distractions!

Too pretty to sew or maybe that's a good excuse...

As I will need the first {demo} quilt top ready to go for the next meeting, it was time to address the border situation. I had used every bit of the cut strips possible and in doing so, ended up with a quilt that was 1" wider than it was tall. Very weird proportions that were not to my taste at all. Yes, it could have been easily turned to the vertical presentation, but that's not what I wanted!

Always better with applique

So borders it will be. I cut and sewed narrow borders onto the sides and then decided to applique words onto the much wider bottom border. I have four or five applique projects prepped and ready to go and what do I do? Throw something right in the middle of it all and try for a rushed finish! In this pic, nothing is sewn down there yet, but I'm working on it. Word by word, letter by letter. The applique fabric used was that interesting light lavender mauve fabric that started the entire color palette. Looking pretty washed out in this picture but I can assure you that it looks way better than it might seem.

Starting to come together

Remember the new project? After playing around with the practice strips the other day, I came up with this idea for layout. Because the blocks only finish out at 9", 16 blocks make it way too small for an entire quilt. I took the remaining strips and cut all the really wide ones in half. Then I added another two fat quarters and a couple remnants of others. Still have to cut more cream strips, but the plan is to make a whole border surround with a longish strippy coin look. 

The not-very-exciting-looking strips

It's not the most 'wowza' quilt ever, but I'm actually really enjoying the work. More so than the improv. quilt meeting project at this point! I mean, who likes sewing the rows together? I think it's the open ended results, the already cut strips, the Gee-Bend vibe and now {moving forward}, maybe the medallion layout problem solving. It's been fun to see if I can make anything interesting out of these very 'blah' fabrics. The good thing is, I've been bemoaning for awhile the absolute lack of manly looking quilt tops in the drawers. Once in awhile I want to gift a quilt to a guy and it just seems so silly to give them a girly look quilt! So yeah. Win, win. Making lemonade out of lemons and all that.  

Finishing Up the Last Minute Christmas Makes Was Great Fun

Well, here it is! Playing with Scale #2 is a true blue finish. It's been hanging around for awhile, just waiting on the binding stitches. While hand quilting this one, I decided to gift it to our oldest granddaughter. This seems to have a happy, youthful vibe plus it will match with the decor in her bedroom. Not that it matters to me, but it will probably make her mama happy!

Playing With Scale #2 is finished!

It's large enough that she should be able to use it for years and years too. Personally I have a fondness for quilts that will grow with children. My own children very much cherished the ones given to them by me and others, when they were little. By the time they were old enough for a change, those quilts were often faded and many times mended. Three times is the charm. Time to put them up for good!

I have been stressing over making a princess quilt or something equally appealing to this sweet little charmer, but never felt any major inspiration strike. Finally, I tried to look at it from the position of just being gifted a quilt 'from grandma'. Okay, that works too! She's only four. I could probably make her a frog quilt and she would be delighted, she's just that easy.

So glad I added the applique flowers.

I have to say that it was an absolute joy to hand quilt this particular quilt. No pressure whatsoever, no marking, and no thinking really, except for whichever thread I had picked out for each specific area. Love that so much! It makes me realize that I need to keep making scrappy, improv. quilts to mix in with the other more ordered quilts that I make, even if just for the hand quilting love.

The hand quilting really added to the quilt....

It was difficult to get proper pictures with the winter light being so variable these days. I actually had to get the quilt out for two different settings because so many pictures were just too dark the first time around. Now there's a Christmas tree right in the middle of the best-lighting-in-the-house, so pictures are going to be getting more and more problematic until the end of the month.

Love the vintage fabric addition {in green}

Not quite sure when this quilt was actually started, but it's not been much more than a year. The entire quilt was started based on an AHIQ challenge, Playing With Scale. This was the second attempt at this challenge and yes, I know the large and small triangles are different types. That was totally on purpose. The concept of scale still works and was actually quite fun seeing it all come together. In spite of the nerves 'cuz there's most generally a wee bit of anxiety when doing improv. around here! That's just part and parcel of trying to work free of a script, but always so thrilling when things start to 'click' properly and you can see some momentum happening.

A different color palette, but lots of fun to work with!

One of the things that makes this quilt work, {in my mind} is that it mostly has the same background fabric throughout. This light green/white print was one where I bought the rest of a bolt of clearance fabric {for a backing fabric} and then switched quilt tops and only used up about three yards of it. Then I was like, 'What am I going to do with all this leftover fabric?'  Hmm.... That may have been what jump started this entire fabric stack!

You'll find that I rarely, ever intentionally buy a great lot of a single fabric for background fabric usage. Instead, I rely on pulling enough similar feel fabrics together from the stash to fake it or else, don't care if they blend less than perfectly together. Truly, in my mind, it's {usually} much more interesting if they don't work fabulously well together, and even more intriguing if one or two of the fabrics squawk a little about the ultimate pairing. More of that utility, make-do siren song that speaks so well to me?

A few strips of shirting fabric added in here and there for character

It's just funny that whenever something like this happens, on those very rare occasion, it's totally by accident. I mean seriously. What if I bought oodles of some odd print and brought it home and absolutely hated it in the potential background fabric position? Then I'd be out all that money and end up having to use it as a backing fabric. The horror! In this case though, I found it very refreshing to keep reaching for the same fabric over and over, knowing it was going to be the 'calm' area in my busy, scrappy improv. quilt. I know this is the way a lot of quilters work, but it's the opposite of how I normally do things!

Wonky quilts are the best

Lots of pictures of the same quilt, but well, you gotta remember that this is my quilting journal. That's really what this has been about from the start. The chronicles of Quilty Folk if you will, and I've invited others to take a peek as I travel along.

All free cut strips

As of this weekend, all of my {soon-to-be-gifted} Christmas makes are finally done! Yay! The two little doll quilts, below, ended up being such a blast to put together. Both of these were started from leftover bits in the orphan totes which totally makes me smile. Such a good idea and also, excellent procrastination from what really should have been happening around here. For some reason, the season came way too early this year...

Doll quilts for some of my nieces

The first little doll quilt used up the very last blocks from a project I've previously turned into two different baby quilts, one that happened just last month. These blocks were right on top so an easy choice, and wowsers, am I glad to see the last of them used up.The first two went for little baby boys and now the last, is a doll quilt for a young girl. Really versatile blocks depending on the colors used alongside! Now I just wish there was record of whether the original project used up one jelly roll or maybe two? Cannot remember those details just now. 

The second doll quilt came from the abandoned bits from the earlier Improv. Wheels quilt and also just a day playing with free cut Drunkards Path blocks a long while ago. Was terrible at it and they mostly ended up being wrinkly and not lying flat at all. Love the look, but hate the massive amount of fabric waste too. Will have to try again some day in the future when I have a mountain of fabric that needs to go.*wink  Weren't we just sort of talking about that?

And then there was also this quilt, you might remember, which was made from literally, the cut-offs from those same, original Improv. Wheels blocks. It's always endlessly fascinating for me to see the similar but oh-so-unique look derived from exact same pieced units or fabric pieces. It's silly, but sometimes there seems to be more of a thrill from the second or third time around quilt than the first! Orphan blocks/units are just too much fun to throw out, don't you think? So many possibilities and then lookie, lookie! Super fast doll quilts all because I had something easy to start playing with. What it does is eliminate that initial step of decision making. What color does this need to be? What fabrics should I pull? The Orphan blocks lead the way and before you know it, you're already halfway through with a project!

 Machine quilted in straight rows, nothing fancy

And last but not least, are the matching {Barbie} doll quilts for the granddaughter. Of course. It's not like I ever did this for my own girls! So sad, that, but it's too late for that now. I couldn't stop at just one right? And before even making an attempt to check myself, was also making matching pillows. Pillows? I am smiling so much as I'm typing this. Just too funny! They perfectly match the little charmers Christmas quilt and should bring her oodles of fun for all her dolls living in the three-story play townhouse. See, now she'll like the larger quilt even more because it will 'match' the Barbie quilts, which is a very important thing. Our granddaughter is a details girl at heart. Aha! There's actually a method to my madness!

The Barbie quilts, all washed up and ready for play

My daughters rolled their eyes at me and my husband agreed that I was a bit crazy. Totally drawing the line at making Barbie clothes though. Not gonna happen! So that's that. Other than one long afternoon ordering Christmas presents online and buying a couple little baby dolls while doing the grocery shopping, there's not much Christmas organization going on here yet. Will have to step it up and stop with all the fun, quilty procrastination! Who knew last minute Christmas projects could be so enjoyable?