July 2016 – That Crafty Cara

Another baby quilt completed during this Year of ALL THE BABIES™! This was for another friend from college, and I decided to bust out the coveted Briar Rose charm packs that I had been saving for “something special.” She had mentioned in Facebook comments that she hoped to not “drown in a sea of pink,” and Briar Rose is the perfect amount of girly without a lot of pink, in my opinion.

My oldest daughter, Emily, helped me out with piecing the top as part of her summer chores (I’ve assigned one hour of sewing to her everyday in the hopes that she’ll start making a dent in some of her WIPs). I then took over from there with the quilting and finishing.

I was stressing pretty bad about the baby quilts when I started quilting this one, and I just decided to let go of all of the expectations of getting gifts done before the babies were born so I could actually enjoy the process of making the gifts. I was going to burn through the quilting on this with a simple stipple design, but the quilt spoke to me and it wanted some sort of floral quilting. Floral stipple? Nope. Chrysanthemum all-over design? Nope. And then the idea of vines and clover popped into my head, and the quilt clapped its hands in excitement, and off we went. It took longer to do, but I’m so glad I went that route. It was a good exercise in doing something new.

I tracked down some Briar Rose yardage* for the back, which made my matchy-matchy heart so happy, and I dipped into my preciously-hoarded stash of my own Briar Rose yardage for the binding.

I decided to take some time and also have fun with the label, and I love how it turned out…little, teeny pinwheels! Oh, be still my heart. Love, love, love.

It’s simple patchwork, yes, but I’m super proud of it–beautiful fabric, new quilting design, and adorable little label. It makes me smile to look at the pictures every time I see them. AND it was a joint project with my girl…win-win all around.

*I found the Briar Rose yardage at Lark Cottons, and they still have yardage of various prints!

Yes, it is indeed a post from me, and it’s even about a finished project. Whew, end-of-school kinda kicked my butt this year, and I haven’t been sewing, blogging, or doing anything beyond mommy duty for months. Life gets that way sometimes.

Anyway, you’re here for the finished quilt, not my life story. Here we go…I give you the FINISHED Dr. Seuss Baby Quilt:

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SONY DSC So, many years ago, I don’t how many precisely (five? eight?), the Dr. Seuss fabric came out and people went absolutely bonkers for it, myself included. I bought up a couple yards without any plan for them, and, because I was in the midst of homeschooling and really young kids, it went into my stash to hibernate.

This May or June I found out that a friend from college was pregnant…and due to give birth in about three weeks or so. Now, I’d always liked this friend, but I was in the midst of my “young children” years when she had her other kids and I hadn’t been able to make anything back then, but here I was, all primed for baby quilt-making, just a little short on time…and after a couple of days of stewing over it, I just decided to go for it. Operation Sew-It-Like-You-Mean-It was a go.

Stash diving brought out the Dr. Seuss goods, which I matched up with some other coordinating fabrics, and I found a fun pattern that looked like it could come together quickly in Amy Smart’s Fabulously Fast Quilts. Woo hoo!

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SONY DSC It was fast, and I had a lot of fun making it! And, to top it off, I bought some of the most perfect binding fabric from a member of my quilt guild. I love, love, love the black and white stripe!

I used up all of my yellow Dr. Seuss print on the back, bordered with strips of the Dr. Seuss prints from the front.

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I think it’s rather happy, no matter which side you’re looking at. I hope it’s well-loved, and used until it’s worn out to rags. That’s Valhalla for a baby quilt.

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