animals for arlo baby boy quilt

Just counted and there's SEVEN finished quilts I need to write about! So forgive me if I'm short on words, but I have a lot of catching up to do! I started this one in late Autumn for a baby boy named Arlo. a baby named Arlo needs a quilt with animals, so that's just what i did. i scrappy-cut little bits of various animal fabrics (many of these made appearances in other baby quilts! i see something from Holden's quilt, the doggies from Beau's quilt, the turtles from Gregory's quilt, an elephant from Raylee's quilt, etc. I guess it pays to save scraps...)  i used grey, red and green as the basis for the animal blocks, then alternated with the bold blue. i truly enjoy making patchwork quilts and this one was no exception. I love catching glimpses of the quilt whenever I look through my instagram feed. and Arlo happens to be extraordinarily adorable so I love catching glimpses of him as well. 

Schminkey and Baltimore inspect the quilt. They approve. Don't worry, I immediately washed it after this photo was taken.

lotta jansdotter california king quilt for our bed

we got a new california king-sized bed when we moved last march, and since then i've wanted to make a quilt for the bed. i've hoarded most of lotta jansdotter's windham fabrics since they first debuted in 2011. at one count, i had about 40 (!!?) different yards of her fabric from the 3 collections (echo, glimma, bella). So...it seemed perfect to use her fabrics for the bed quilt. the thought of seeing the fabric each and every day on my bed just seemed like the natural thing to do. she's by far my favorite designer (fabric and otherwise) and i don't imagine ever growing tired of the patterns or the colors.

a lot a lotta

i decided to go pretty simple design-wise for the quilt. because of the large size, i didn't want get too involved in something that would take me months and months (who has time for piecing intricate blocks with so many gift quilts on the horizon?!)  i chose about 30 of the fabrics (most of the ones in my stash, except the pinks and oranges) and cut strips 8 1/2" in length. from there, i cut random-sized widths and pieced the rows that way. it was as random and improvisational as i've ever been, and the strips came together surprisingly fast. i ended up with 9 rows, each about 120" long. i played around with a few layouts (horizontal stripes? vertical? sashing or no?)

 i decided on horizontal with sashing strips (i used kona snow). i used all lotta for the back, as well (picked up extra yardage of a few prints during a mega fabric.com sale!)

all along, i knew i didn't want to quilt this one myself. but i also knew i wasn't 100% pleased with my outsourced-quilting experience from before...but as luck would have it, i talked to a girl at this baby shower who told me about her mom's local quilting business, all sewn together. i am SO very pleased with the whole experience. nanette showed me all the quilting options & was incredibly patient with my indecisiveness. i even changed my mind about the design after sleeping on it (from 'overlapping arches' to this one instead) and she was receptive and understanding. because she's also a fan of more modern-style quilts, she understood where i was coming from and what suited the look of the quilt.  she did the binding for me, HAD IT FINISHED IN ONE WEEK, and was affordable. if you happen to need quilting services in the nashville area, i wholeheartedly recommend this place.

close up of the quilting

after i picked the quilt up, i snapped these pictures, threw it in the wash, and we've been snuggling with it ever since. i love it!!!

turquoise and peach circles baby girl quilt

looks like i'm finally back on track and blogging about these baby quilts in real time. i finished this one up last week & presented it to the mom-to-be at her baby shower last saturday. i realized that i've shipped away more quilts than i've given in person...and this made me aware of the fact that i get butterflies whenever the recipient opens the gift. i wonder if i am alone in this, or if this is a common phenomenon when people give handmade gifts? regardless, i believe it was well-received by my sweet friend & i hope her baby girl snuggles on it for years to come.

knowing full well that i'd make her a quilt, i had my friend look at my fabric stash while visiting my house to see what sort of colors or prints she was drawn to. with that in mind, i decided to go with turquoise and peach as the main colors for this one.

back when i took quilting 101 with alexia abegg, "the saucer block" was one of the ones we learned in class for our sampler quilt.   the sampler quilt lives on our couch (it's the go-to tv-watching lap quilt around here)...the saucer block has remained my favorite block, so i thought i'd re-visit it for this quilt.

alexia has a pattern for a similar circle quilt in her book "liberty love," so that also proved to be a source of inspriation. (it's called the "goodnight fairy tale quilt" in the book). however, in class we made 12" squares, so i used that template rather than the one she provides in the book (which yields a 10" square).  alexia uses subtle cream/neutral prints for the background, so i did the same (a cute moda fabric + some leftover heather bailey from my first quilt). i pulled the various turquoise and peach prints from my stash bin for the saucer centers.

the blocks came together with relative ease (although those curves were a little trickier than i remember!) i added a border (kona snow) & i think it ended up around 40"x40".  good ole straight horizontal lines for the quilting, and lizzy house pearl bracelet for the binding.

lilac and turquoise greek cross baby girl quilt

this quilt is for emelia elizabeth, who came into this world just two days ago. emelia's mama tommie is my sister carrie's best friend & i've known her for 25 years.  this is baby #3, and once again i didn't do this whole quilting thing when the first two were born (sorry, ellie and reuben).

i picked out the purple dandelion fabric during textile's annual sale (it's an older alexander henry print). i used kona amethyst, aloe and snow to coordinate, as well as this denyse schmidt print from joann:

i didn't know what sort of pattern to use for this. i trolled flickr and pinterest for inspiration, and finally decided on fresh lemon's greek cross block from this tutorial). i found this tutorial for a quick-piecing method very helpful & time-saving.
greek crosses are another one of those things that seem to have hundreds of different layout possibilities. these were just two i tried out:

option 1?

option 2?

 once i sewed the top together, i decided to add a border to make it just a little larger.

i straight-line quilted on the inside of the squares & also around each of the crosses.

 

back

the quilt, just chillin on the swing

triangle solids quilt for the mister

after making quilts for both of my sisters, my dad, and countless baby quilts, i was beginning to feel a little guilty about not having made one for my husband. i kept my eye open for fabrics he may like and patterns he may find appealing, but the quest for the perfect combination of both kept this quilt un-made for a quite awhile. plus, i know how particular he is about EVERYTHING, so i wanted this one to be just right. i can't even remember how the decision was ultimately made, but i pulled a stack of some kona solids (windsor, sage, yarrow, chocolate and medium grey), asked him if he liked the color combination (he did), and ordered 2 yards of each.

from there, i set out cutting a bunch of triangles with my trusty creative grids 60 degree triangle ruler. (i cut them at 6").  i played around with different layouts and asked for his input. i love the hundreds of permutations that occur with triangles...

we decided on organized rows, double brown. (no go on the moon print, but i was able to use those in tracey's baby quilt). i spent the month of february sewing row-by-row whenever i'd get a chance (our house had sold but we weren't closing/moving til mid-march, so i had some spare sewing time again). i finished about half the quilt top before the move.

schminkey the cat, keeping tabs on me

new sewing room floor (and the quilt top 2/3 complete)

i can't remember when i got back to work on the other half, but it was well after we had moved in and unpacked. 17 rows of 21 triangles = 357 triangles. it's about 60" wide by 90"long, approximately the size of an extra-long twin quilt.

straight-line quilting, of course.

for the back, i did something a little cheesy, but i incorporated championship racing stripes, a nod to the mister's love of cycling. and kind of a bianchi celeste back there, too (it's the kona sage from the front). you can really see the diamond-shape quilting on the back.

says he: "i love it." he plans on taking it out on tour with him, so this quilt will see the likes of a stinky 15-passenger van, lots of states, some drippy taco bell fire sauce, and maybe some laundromats on the way. it's ready for adventure.

side note: i used quilter's dream wool batting for the first time; normally i use the natural select cotton. i've washed and dried the quilt a few times and i'm seeing crazy amount of "bearding" with this. i didn't even know this term existed, but when i googled "wool batting fuzzy problems" (or something like that) i learned that this sometimes happens.  it has to do with science! and molecules!  (if i think of it this way, i feel slightly less disappointed). i'll definitely stick to using regular cotton batting from here on out.  

moony triangles for baby boy quilt

Skipping #16 (a special quilt for the Mister....years in the making) to tell you about the 17th quilt I made: a triangle quilt for my cousin Tracey's baby boy (Brandon, born on July 30). I didn't know how to quilt when her first two kiddos were born (sorry Mairead and Connor), so I was excited to make a quilt for baby #3.

I had cut the moon triangles (part of the Lizzy House "Constellations" collection) as a "maybe" for Quilt #16, but I didn't end up using them. So I thought they'd be perfect for this quilt. I had some leftover grey & navy triangles, and I used the beautiful white starry fabric & a Lotta Jansdotter turquoise stripe as well.

it's always fun testing out various layouts

finished product

This one was a lot of fun to make. I loved the way the fabrics blended together - the colors are so calming; I am happy it went to a familial home. I still haven't met the 2nd child in Tracey's brood & I am hoping I get a chance to visit them all soon. If we lived in the same state, I know I'd hang out with them all the time. 

more Lotta for the binding

the back...used scraps to make the "shards"...

seven seas baby boy quilt

Hey-o, it's been awhile. I suppose selling and buying a house will do that to a person. In an effort to chronicle all the quilts I make, I went back in my time machine to revisit a quilt made for Maddox, Holden's baby brother.  I can't even remember when I started this one - was it December of '12? January? Again, selling and buying a house will make your mind mush.  Regardless, Maddox was born in March, and I know I mailed it off before then, so....

Maddox's family lives near to the beach & his dad can surf, so I went nautical for this one. I chose a few prints from Cloud 9's Seven Seas collection. I'm an absolute sucker for Michele Brummer Everett fabrics (I was a fan of her Monsterz collection, too)...all those critters! They're so strange and awesome and adorable!  The flags seemed very Newport Beach to me, which then made me think about Arrested Development.... All the while Echo and the Bunnymen's song "Seven Seas" is playing in my head.... and then this quilt is the result.

The colors are bolder than I'm used to/drawn to, but it works. A beachy blue and yellow and red to go along with the elements in the prints. I quilted sideways V's jutting from one of the sides.