More baby stuff

Unsurprisingly, I have been making a ton of baby stuff. In addition to two complete quilts and the car seat blanket, I have done a bunch of onesies and made a car seat canopy.

First up, the iron on appliqués from Kat. I ironed them in place and then used invisible thread to permanently affix them. I don't trust that iron-on stuff to last.

I'm not sure which one is my favorite, they're all so cute!

Second, my own homemade appliqués. I asked my husband to help me with these and he got surprisingly in to it. He picked out the penguin (I traced it from some picture he found online) and the fabric for the guitar. I did all of these except the cat by hand because I wanted to be able to use different thread colors for each part. Luckily, I remembered this box of embroidery thread my grandma had given me years ago and dug it out of the basement. I forgot how time consuming hand stitching is!

I'm super excited about the sheep made from the sheep fabric I got in Korea

Finally, I made a reversible car seat cover. I sort of mashed together the instructions from here and here for the general sizing. To make it reversible I essentially made giant buttonholes for the velcro straps to go through instead of permanently affixing the straps to the cover. Much to my husband's disappointment you can't really reverse it while it is attached to the car seat. We are pretty sure that it would be physically possible to make that happen, but I am still not sure how. Also, it's way too late.

It is also too late for another good idea he had. I was thinking about using the last iron-on appliqué on this because there were two koalas and it seems silly to have two of the same shirt for the baby. However, I decided to put the koala on before I thought to make it reversible. What I should have done is use both koalas on this so there would be one on each side. Stupid husband, why didn't you tell me this earlier! So now I don't know if I'm going to put a koala on at all because it would be kind of weird to see just the outline from the other side.

Pieced side using the remainder of the math fabric I've been saving for years.
And yes, this baby is doomed to be a nerd!

What I generally consider the inside. 

A close-up of a velcro strap and the slits it flips through to make the cover reversible.

This car seat cover/canopy was the last thing I wanted done before the baby came, so I think I'm done making baby things (for now... ^_^). I still have some more plain white onesies that I can appliqué (I owe my husband a T-Rex one), but they're all like 6 month size so I'm not exactly in a hurry.

Red Baby Complete!

Just in the knick of time I finished up the Red Baby quilt and a matching car seat quilt. They will both be going off tomorrow to await the arrival of my friend's baby in November.

For the blanket I did a fleece backing and straight line quilting using a zig-zag stitch. I also did a machine binding, so this was another quick finish.

The colors are a little off in this pic. It's brighter in person.

You can see the zig zags pretty well from the back.

I made this car seat quilt warmer than mine because my friend lives in Colorado and I heard it's cold there... I used a fleece backing and a layer of batting so baby should be toasty! Despite the small size of this quilt, the basic stipple quilting, and machine binding this was not a quick finish. All those tiny HSTs (each one finished at 1 inch) and the essentially double batting made for some thick seams even though I meticulously ironed them all open. I had quite a few problems with stitches skipping. Usually my strategy for FMQ stippling is to up the tension and floor it so I don't get eyelashing, but in this case I actually had to go slowly.

Thanks again, Panda! You are an excellent test subject.

I was pleasantly surprised with how well the points matched up. I guess all that trimming was worth it!

Linking to TGIFF hosted this week at Anja Quilts.

Finished: Double Pinwheel and Car Seat Quilt

Since the doctor told me last week "if the baby decided to come now, we wouldn't try to stop it," we finally got the car seat and stroller put together. I, of course, immediately used my baby-ish sized panda to test out the car seat quilt I made.

The panda is a better test subject than the cats...

I followed this tutorial from Moda Bakeshop, except I kind of messed it up because the directions were slightly confusing in the middle. Or I wasn't paying attention. Or both. Anyway, I think it turned out cute and it definitely fits the car seat despite being smaller than the 25x35" the directions say it should be. I was able to use some scrap batting, a simple FMQ pattern in the lattice, and one of those decorative stitches on my machine for the binding so the whole thing went together pretty fast.

Close up of binding and ties. I could see velcro also working for this.

The car seat quilt actually uses scraps and leftovers from a basic double pinwheel baby quilt.

Finished size about 30x40"

This quilt got a fleece backing for coziness, spiral and loop quilting, and machine binding. It was another quick finish once the top was together. The fabrics for this are things that I had collected together with the thought that they would go well and the double pinwheel was finally the right pattern for it. All I had to buy was the fleece because I already had the backing for the car seat quilt and the quilting used up some old variegated thread I had.

The nice thing about fleece backing is it doesn't need batting so basting takes like 2 minutes!

Another decorative stitch binding. I believe my husband chose this one. 

Apparently all of my favorite link ups are slowly disappearing, so this is just going to have to be link-less until I can find something new :(

Finished: Double Pinwheel and Car Seat Quilt

Since the doctor told me last week "if the baby decided to come now, we wouldn't try to stop it," we finally got the car seat and stroller put together. I, of course, immediately used my baby-ish sized panda to test out the car seat quilt I made.

The panda is a better test subject than the cats...

I followed this tutorial from Moda Bakeshop, except I kind of messed it up because the directions were slightly confusing in the middle. Or I wasn't paying attention. Or both. Anyway, I think it turned out cute and it definitely fits the car seat despite being smaller than the 25x35" the directions say it should be. I was able to use some scrap batting, a simple FMQ pattern in the lattice, and one of those decorative stitches on my machine for the binding so the whole thing went together pretty fast.

Close up of binding and ties. I could see velcro also working for this.

The car seat quilt actually uses scraps and leftovers from a basic double pinwheel baby quilt.

Finished size about 30x40"

This quilt got a fleece backing for coziness, spiral and loop quilting, and machine binding. It was another quick finish once the top was together. The fabrics for this are things that I had collected together with the thought that they would go well and the double pinwheel was finally the right pattern for it. All I had to buy was the fleece because I already had the backing for the car seat quilt and the quilting used up some old variegated thread I had.

The nice thing about fleece backing is it doesn't need batting so basting takes like 2 minutes!

Another decorative stitch binding. I believe my husband chose this one. 

Apparently all of my favorite link ups are slowly disappearing, so this is just going to have to be link-less until I can find something new :(

Baby Irish Chain - Finished!

The title says it all, I finished up this cute little Double Irish Chain quilt this week. The finished size is 35"x45". I just did a simple stipple for the quilting and I was able to use some leftover binding that I already had all ironed, so finishing this was a snap.

Hopefully the light quilting will help keep this soft and cozy

I had these super cute strawberries from Korea for the back

Linking to Finish it Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts

Progress on Baby Stuff

This weekend I moved two projects from the "to be pieced" to the "to be quilted" column!

First is the Country Home quilt. I started this on a whim sometime last spring/summer so I'm not particularly attached, but I do like how it's turning out. If I like the final product I guess I'll keep it, though it is more toddler/kid size than baby size.

I'm considering doing one more black border, thoughts?

Second is a Double Irish Chain. I wanted this quilt to have a scrappy/random feel even though there are only 4 fabrics in the chains so I didn't do any layouts in advanced. This was incredibly difficult for me, but I am actually quite pleased with the finished top. I don't think I'll be putting a border on even though it's only like 35"x45".

I was worried the green would aggregate and stand out too much, but I think it's okay.

Finally, I am also making slow but steady progress on processing the rest of the scraps from Red Wedding into a Red Car Seat quilt to accompany Red Baby. I saved all the little triangle scraps from making the flying geese units on the stars of the first quilt and have sewn them all into HSTs. I'm now ironing and trimming them. There are theoretically 336 total HST units, but I haven't counted them yet. Since each HST is being trimmed to 1.5" square (which would be 14"x24" finished size if there are actually 336) I have to figure out how to augment the triangles to reach 25"x35" finished carseat size. I have small amounts of the coordinating fabric left from Red Wedding so I'm thinking of peppering in larger HSTs of various sizes or maybe just squares if I get lazy.

This is going to take FOREVER! I can only trim like 10 at a time before I get bored...

Joining Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation. 

Design Wall Monday: Baby Stuff

I've been a little quiet over here on the blog for the last few months, but I have been quilting! Mostly I've been making baby stuff because I know like a jillion pregnant people/new babies: me, my friend's sister, my labmate, another labmate's wife, a fellow MD/PhD student I TA with, 3 people I went to school with, and like 4 of my cousins.

I have to admit that my baby is taking quilt priority, I guess I'm being greedy... Seriously though, no remorse. So far, I have completed a blanket and matching carseat blanket for me, have made significant progress on some old WIPs (probably also for me, I mean baby...), finished one blanket to be gifted, started another carseat blanket to be gifted, remembered that I bought a baby sized quilt kit back in January when I first found out I was pregnant, pulled fabric for a baby sized Double Irish Chain, and started brainstorming ideas for appliqued onesies.

Here's what's on the Design Wall (or bed or table) these days:

Red Baby with leftovers from Red Wedding

Layout for a carseat quilt

Double Pinwheels (matches the carseat quilt)

Country Home, a very old WIP

Linking to Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times

EDIT: I just discovered that this is my 100th post! Woo!

Red Wedding {Quilt}

Not at all like GoT Red Wedding, which I've heard the show did an excellent job portraying, this one is a quilt. I bought this kit like 2 years ago and finally mailed it off to the recipient this week, about a week and a half after their 1 year anniversary. Better late than never I guess. The pattern is Paris Flea Market Find in the Rhapsody in Reds collection from Connecting Threads.

Sorry, the lighting is a little weird in this pic

I was stalled for a long time at the flimsy stage with this quilt. First, it was because I didn't have enough floor space to baste a queen size quilt so I had to take it over to a friend's house. Then it was because I couldn't figure out how to quilt it. My original idea was to FMQ outlines of things that represented the couple in the 25 patch squares. This proved to be way beyond my skill set. The next plan was to echo quilt around the stars. This plan was foiled by giant quilt in tiny machine; it was impossible to turn. I ended up tracing each star and then doing an all over stars and loops pattern. In retrospect, I think going around the stars was a waste of effort because you really can't tell. This is the first quilt I've done where the quilting is not more obvious on the back. The variegated white to black thread I used gets completely lost in all the red.

A close-up

Overall I feel okay with this finish, but not really pleased, if that makes sense. I'm not 100% sure that this was my best effort. For the first time I really felt the limitations of my machine and wish I could afford some professional quilting now and again. At least those Shout color catchers did their job and it didn't bleed in the wash! Definitely something to be thankful for ^_^

Linking to Finish it Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts

An Old Finish

Back in like March I was asked to bind an antique quilt that was made and hand quilted by my friend's friend's grandmother. It is all hexagons and totally beautiful.

Those are not reproduction fabrics!

I was slightly nervous, but also really excited because I had never done a jagged edge binding before. It was pretty difficult because those hexies are like 1 inch per side so the binding is a little thick. I ended up sort of sewing the points in while doing the hand sewing part so that it would lay flatter. I am more or less satisfied with the result and the requester was overjoyed, so pretty much a success!

The binding color almost perfectly matches the center hexagons

This counts as a double old finish because I was done with the binding back in like early May. I'm going to blame the newest addition to my menagerie for the delay in posting. Say hello to Pancake!

Linking to Finish it Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts

Baby Blankets - Finished

I finished up both baby blankets that I was working on. One is already with the intended recipient and the other is going to its new home on Sunday.

Finish #1 - Baby Spools

For this one I repeated 6 different FMQ designs in each block using white for the top and variegated pastels for the back. The designs are: flowers on a vine, stipple, square spiral, square stipple, pebbles, and a sort of elongated stipple, in that order. The quilting is quite dense overall so the post wash crinkle is intense. For the binding I found this gray with little squiggles that look almost like stripes.

Finished size: 42" x 48"

Front

Back

Glamour Shot

Finish #2 - Summer (Spring?) Slice

For this one I did a super lazy loose stipple in variegated pink/purple. For the binding I used more of that gray squiggle/stripe with a black flange for a speedy machine binding. The tiny one took like a week and a half. This one took one day...

I also realized when I went to finish putting it all together that I had made 64 triangle blocks which should make an 8x8 quilt. However, when I was doing the top, I cleverly decided that this quilt should be a rectangle and made it 7x9. So not only is the pattern not really like the original, but I had one random square leftover. Pure genius.

Finished size: 52" x 66"

Front

Back (that's the leftover square)

Close up

The full gift includes a card and a little thing for a digital download of baby-friendly (but not obnoxious) lullaby music. I used this great tutorial to fold the quilts up into little packages, thanks Kat! I also pinned on tags informing the recipients that these quilts are machine washable.

Ready for gifting!

Linking to Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts

WIP: Baby Blankets

I am currently in the process of making two baby blankets. The first is actually one I started a long time ago, a rainbow Summer Slice. It is going to my cousin who is having a baby shower in 2 weeks.

Top completed!

The second is a simple spools pattern that is going to my husband's new boss who's wife is expecting any day now. I am so excited that he asked me to make a quilt as a gift. It's very... validating? I don't know exactly, but it makes me happy.

I think this will be the final layout

Both quilts are going to baby girls to be, so they're both getting pink flannel backings. I am currently totally undecided on quilting. Part of me wants to do something fun, but part of me wants to be quick/lazy and bust out a stipple.

Also, there is apparently no more WIP Wednesday so I guess I'll have to find a new link-up...