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