Quilt of the Week

If only I really had time to make a quilt a week...but I digress, and I haven't even started.

This one is a commissioned baby gift. The request was that it be the style of a quilt I made a few years ago (now living with a cutie pie named Lucy). The recipient likes light pink, light peach, light blue, etc.

Above, left to right, the original, the first layout (ugh), the final plan.

Amazing what different fabric can do to the same design. While working on this quilt I came to two realizations:
1. There is a big difference between light colors that are pastel and light colors that are bright. I am sure you can recognize a pastel, but finding the good light/brights is a bit tricky. Thank goodness I got some new things because the first layout for this one was aptly named the "Easter Basket" by my husband.
2. It's hard to recreate the feel of an old quilt with all new fabrics. Ultimately, I needed to let the new one live its own life. That's when it got good. I was finally happy with the fabrics and layout.

Then there was a new challenge. I ordered fabric online for the first time and was terrified. (I got everything from Hawthorne Threads, a great site though a few colors and scale of prints were hard to see clearly online.) The main fabric that I chose is a voile. I knew that before ordering, but I wasn't sure what it would mean. Well, voile is a lighter, sometimes sheer cotton fabric. I looked up this fabric line and found that it can be used for quilting, is not sheer, but is slippery. Hmmmm. It had been hard to find prints that I liked for this quilt, so I ordered this voile despite the slippery concerns. Indeed, it was a bit more slippery than a standard quilter's cotton. I found with careful pinning there was no problem sewing it, and the end result is a quilt that's really sumptuous and soft.

To sum it all up, all's well that ends well.

The top was pieced, the quilt sandwich prepared, and the binding was made.

All done! I like this one a lot, and I learned a lot making it.