If I Ran the Circus...

A fabric-inspired baby quilt

and their matching blocks:

Order Up! Fireflies with a Side of Scrap

My First Panel Quilt

In 2011, we hit the East Tennesee Quilt Shop Hop. As long as we were in the general area, I stopped by to visit a dear friend in Kentucky. It was June and the fireflies came out as the sun went down. I'd never been in the South during the summer and that particular insect isn't common in Washington state. One of the girls, in a very polite southern way, gently made fun of me and then caught a blinking, glowing bug for me to hold.

Fast forward to the 2014 Western Washington Quilt Shop Hop. Although not a theme fabric, I spotted a baby quilt made with a panel from Wee Wander fabric collection. The pattern is available as a free download from Sarah Jane Studios. It reminded me of our pleasant time hanging out in the holler and I was wishing I had a baby who needed a special quilt.

What a coincidence! My friend from Kentucky announced a few weeks later that she was expecting her first grandbaby. As soon as I knew if we were creating a baby boy or baby girl gift, we got right on it.

We invite you to follow along:

We started with this panel -- the one I fell in love with when I saw it at The Quilting Loft in Ballard. I didn't buy it then because, well you quilters know how a stash can accumulate... When I wanted to get it, it was gone. Although this fabric line had completely sold out in the greater Seattle area, we found it online. Whew!

I've already added a pink feathered border. Now it's time to come up with matching fabrics to complete the scrappy borders and the friendship blocks. Wish us luck!

In a scrap quilt, half the fun might be looking through those hoarded and already-cut-to-size squares for the perfect color path. This year, the process was even more interesting because we had a small and enthusiastic helper. These are his choices from the bin. I may have added and subtracted a few blocks of my own.

Next came sewing the half-triangle squares for the friendship blocks.Since the squares needed to be 2 1/2", I started with slightly larger than 3" squares, marked the diagonals and sewed a scant 1/4" seam each side of the mark. I cut on the mark and pressed each set open. Finally I trimmed each square to size. Quite the scrap pile for such a small pile of finished pieces, isn't it?

Because this precious grandbaby is a girl (and yes, I sometimes fall victim to gender stereotyping), we choose to use more pink and coral and less blue and green. A little arranging, a bit of sewing, a touch of the iron and we have a finished block. This batch of friendship squares is enough to make more than one firefly quilt. Wonder if another baby might need one...

Arranging and piecing the border

And finally, a look at the quilting. This was S's first time on the long arm. With a bit of encouragement and lots of shared laughter, I think she did a great job.

Mailed off to Miss Sweetness the first part of January accompanied by Eric Carle's "The Very Lonely Firefly."

Yo, Beach Babe!

A surprise quilt for a surprise baby!

The nursery is done in a Hawaiian beach (think Lilo and Stitch) theme so we made this quilt to match. The baby's name has been blurred to protect the her privacy.

Putting It All Together

We started with this sketch, done by one of the S's who also helped create the artwork in the nursery. Once we had an idea, we hit the fabric stash and pulled out colors that would complement the walls. We needed blues for the ocean, greens for the trees and bushes, something bright for a surboard, a few brilliant colors for the tropical flowers, white for the fluffy clouds and a shiny yellow for the sun.

Challenge accepted!

The ocean looks lovely doesn't it? We paper pieced the sea together in a fit of insanity. Do not do this the way we did! It was a bad plan. The curves were too long and too tight for the fabric to lay smoothly. I'd suggest needle turn or your favorite applique instead.

The sand was created using a stack and whack technique from Browsing the Web, found in "New Cuts for New Quilts," by Karla Alexander. After the blocks were stitched into a long strip, we top stitched the ocean to the sand and hid the seam with blanket stitching. If you look closely you can see blanket stitching on some of the waves.

Another lesson learned this quilt. Letter are difficult. I'd tried to applique cut out letters in italicized cursive writing -- also a bad plan. We ended up embroidering it in bullion knot which turned out great.

The flowers were a lot easier than they look.

R quilted to match the area. The trees are filled with a meander. The ocean has waves and the sky looks as if someone drew in the wind. She left the tree stems and flowers empty for extra dimension but quilting in close to them.

Those extra inches of palm fronds? We'll get a look at them later.

Here's a close up of the sky and trees. You can almost see the wind lifting the branches.

You can see the blanket stitch holding them down. We chose a variegated green floss and used two strands.

Remember the dangling palm fronts. Look below. We continued them onto the back.

All in all we're very happy with the way this little quilt turned out.

Everything Little Boy Quilt

Frogs, water, kites, fish...everything little boy. This quilt has them all set in a snowball pattern and surrounded by tiny, bright squares.

Here are a couple individual blocks. You can see my quilting. I did it on my sewing machine and think it turned out pretty good.

Quick and Easy Baby Quilt

Are you looking for an easy, almost fail proof quilt you can make up in an afternoon? I stumbled onto one in the back room of a small town quilt shop. During the East Tennessee shop hop, I was introduced to an intriguing cutting guide. It made pinwheel patterns from 9 patches. Although it wastes a bit of fabric, it significantly cuts down on matching seams. The end product looks more complicated than the actual process.



I chose a variety pack of dotted batiks, using a leftover muted background. An abstract butterfly pattern hooks the blocks together. It's machine quilted on my sewing machine. Overall, it's a quick and easy baby quilt.

Bunnies for Baby

A grand baby quilt! In my mind, I've made this quilt a hundred times or more, but now none of the patterns seem quite right. What would do for an October baby? A wee baby boy?

I've got it! Bunnies! Not in baskets, but hopping along, peeking up over the border or standing up staring. Our pattern began with Easter bunnies in "Our Best Seasonal Quilts by Fons and Porter. Then we made a few changes. They'd be made of felted wool with whiskers and tails to pull. We pieced tiny split, modified 9-patches in pastels and beige between the bunnies. How did that work out? Judge for yourself. Here it is fresh off the long arm. If you look closely you'll see that R quilted machined pow's behind the bunnies and added carrots in the borders and in a few beige squares. I believe a butterfly and buzzy bee might be flying around there somewhere as well.

We brought it home and added a border. You can also see the back, an old-fashioned bunny print on navy. A pair of booties sneaked in the photo. I don't know how that happened. ;)

Whiskers and tails joined the quilt at long last. The whiskers are a bamboo, silk yarn; the tails snipped wool circles.



Such happy bunnies. Great job on the faces, S!

Safari Quilt

Take a couple small pieces of fabric that you can't stand to throw out combined with an urge to organize and minimize that sewing "mess" and what do you get?



Here's a peek at some of the individual blocks:





Even the back features a safari theme.

Crazy Patch Quilt for a Baby Girl

S loves crazy patchwork so what better choice for a baby quilt for a friend. Instead of an overall patchwork pattern, we chose to make and piece together blocks. As a child, this friend loved strawberry shortcake. We happened to have a piece in our stash and it became the back.