Mommy and Baby Gifts
Back in the winter I undertook to make a couple of crib quilts – one for a niece’s baby and one for a new grandchild expected in July. The baby quilts were finished earlier in the spring and one delivered in March when we were back in Ontario. I was using a pattern ‘Twisted Triangles’ that I found on allpeoplequilt.com. I just checked and I can’t find the instructions but the link shows the original pattern which has more emphasis on the ‘twisted triangles’. I chose to emphasis the lights and darks. The quilting is simple and minimal in this quilt as I was not able to use my left arm to any great extent. I hope the quilts stand up to frequent washings!
After cutting all the pieces I discovered that the pattern would actually make a quilt almost single bed size – larger than I intended. I had cut the pieces for two quilts so set one set of quilt pieces aside and then made two crib size tops from one set. By adding a border I got a good size for cuddle quilts (flannel backing) or for in a crib. I’m now told that you don’t use stiff bedding for babies because they might pull it up and smother. Is this true? Hopefully they will be used as daytime floor blankets etc.
As my arm healed from the surgery in May I got restless and pulled out the second set of pieces. I found that I could do piecing with one hand and a bit, so by cutting the original triangles in half, was able to come up with this pattern. Because the nursery is decorated with a night time theme – dark blue walls and star and moon decals, I used ‘my style’ star blocks to arrive at the right number of blocks to creat this quilt (approx. 45″x50″. I backed it also with flannel in a cupcake design and gave it to my daughter-in-law as her very own cuddle blanket. My son had received a T-shirt quilt a few years ago and it has had good use!
I wanted to check that my Juki sewing machine and Hinterberg frame had survived shipping last fall so dug them out of storage and assembled them on the lawn under our awning one day to quilt this quilt. I sure prefer quilting large pieces on the frame! Because I did not ship the long frames (drat it all) I could only quilt the center panel of the quilt before I took the quilt from the frame (and I did leave some parts with the longer frames – to be retrieved next time we go east). I then did the border in a chain of stars from a border stencil by free motion quilting (not quite – feed dogs up and straight stitch with frequent starts and stops worked best). The Juki was cleaned and oiled before and after this project and is now back in storage until next time.
What did I learn from this project?
1) I love working with the color in quilts but I get bored easily and now I know why I have moved towards art quilting and fiberart;
2) This is a great way to do stash busting, using up fabrics that you no longer relate to;
3) It was a great way to make use of my time when serious creativity was limited by the cast on my arm; and
4) I can’t wait to get into some of the new books I’ve acquired and start experimenting!