Baby Quilt with Elizabeth Hartman pattern: Post TWO

We had a niece expecting a girl at the end of March, so I wanted to make a fun, feminine baby quilt for her.  Got out Elizabeth Hartman's The Kittens.  It is a larger quilt, so I had to decide how big I wanted mine to be and draft up a plan.  I decided a 3 x 4 layout of 12 blocks would be perfect.  It threw me off a little that the blocks are not square, they are rectangular, so the final borders I used were 4" on the sides, but just 2" on the bottom, otherwise it was going to be too long for what I wanted.  Mine ended up 36" x 50".

I pulled a palette of pinks, fuschia and purple, little bit of orange, and a tiny bit of blue, just for fun.  Then, I got to cutting.  Cut the WHOLE thing out on a weekend, after pairing up some fabrics.  During the week, I started sewing, maybe two blocks at a sitting, in the evening.  Then, my DH was gone on a business trip, so NO requirements on me other than sewing.   Over the weekend I got all the rest of the blocks sewn & started assembly.  Here is a close-up in progress, after attaching the first pair of glasses.  Which were the MOST fun!!

I was showing friends some pictures of quilts by Laura Heine, her business is called Fiber Works in Billings Montana, because I have a class coming up with her.  Her work & patterns are AMAZING; she does floral collage & painterly strips collage, but her color-sense is incredible & her fabric picks are right up my alley.  When she has these beautiful pieces quilted, she uses a simple grid & very flat batting.  The grid is a little uneven, so some of it might look like squares, and some like rectangles.  It is very close together.  She knows that for her patterns, the quilting is just to hold it together, stay quietly in the background, doesn't need to be fancy.  You want to look at her beautiful design, let it shine.  So I thought, hey----that's how I want to quilt this!

By Sunday afternoon, it was spray-basted & ready to go.  I used Quilters Dream Poly, the loft of that is 'Request', their thinnest.  It's a wonderful poly (don't make that face, poly isn't what it used to be!!!) I began quilting it, using the walking foot, but I did attach my guide to keep the lines fairly even, then I just threw in some extra lines, to get the spacing different, just occasionally.  This goes really fast, very minimal marking.  Just one line to start, and then maybe two more times I marked a line, because I got a little off.  The guide is amazing, and to think, for years I didn't use it!  At all.  BIG mistake.  HUGE.  USE IT.

After watching (sort of) the Super Bowl with my sister & her daughter (my sweet niece who shares my Halloween birthday) I went back into the sewing room, and quilted til after midnight.  Once my eyes weren't focusing anymore, I went to bed, got up the next day & repeated.  Quilted by noon the next day, then got the binding on.   Here's a close-up----

And we had a beautiful sunny day, so I could go outside to photograph it on the fence!  And I was just saying I was lousy with deadlines.  EARLY.  Ready.  In just ONE week.

I also love making smaller quilts for use in the stroller or car seat when baby is small.  A nice size is 20" X 24" or so.   Then, when baby gets bigger, they could use that quilt for their dolls or stuffed animals!!  I made this using the scraps from The Kitten Quilt.

It is a simplified pinwheel pattern, with negative space.  I love how they look like they are falling!  The blocks are 4" and I have no idea where I saw the block, but I sketched it out in my 'ideas' book and it sure came in handy here.

Look how sweet they look together!