Aliens for Sarin

Here's an older one.  This is a quilt I made for my friend Bethany and her baby boy Sarin.  What I love about Bethany is how non traditional she is, and so she let me have free reign on his baby quilt. Naturally, I had some alien fabric that I was itching for a reason to use, so I used it here.

I just drew up the appliques based off the aliens on the fabric.

I needed something fairly quick because I didn't manage to start it until the week before Christmas because of course, so this is what I came up with.  Very simple, but pretty cute.

I didn't have the time or cash to have it quilted professionally, so I just did a simple all over with stars and loops.

And by all reports, he loved it.

Baby Quilt

I got suckered in to making a baby quilt...and my first t-shirt quilt. Suckered isn't right...my friend Sarah asked and I said yes, mainly because I have no problem saying "no" to grown ups but I am absolutely incapable of denying an infant pretty much anything (within reason of course).

So I go over to her house and she literally hands me a bag of onesies to make a quilt out of.  What did I get myself into?  I have never made a t-shirt quilt, what thee proper hell am I going to do with these 30,000 onesies?  Make a quilt of course!  I took as many as were useable (meaning, the design wasn't a quarter inch from the seams etc), stabilized them and then cut them all as close to 7" as possible.


There were some REALLY cute ones in there. I love the T-Rex!



Since not all of them could be cut to 7", I had to make them bigger. These are the fabrics I chose to add to the too-small blocks.



Blocks done!



Quilt top, done!


The border fabric is better than anything I could have asked for. I love it when a plan comes together!

It's off at quilting now.  I showed Sarah, and she loved it! I'm really glad. After the last baby blanket I made for a friend, I stopped doing them because of how coldly it was received...I still never see it in pictures being used or anything, and so the fact that a quilt I made for their child has gone unappreciated hurt.  Luckily Sarah and her husband Casey love the quilt and I know their baby will too as he gets older.  Feels good to do good for a friend :-)

I feel like I should probably be doing something else...Oh wait...

Catching up on all of my older projects on here is a bit of a pain, I gotta admit. But I said I would do it...that and my persnickety ways want all this stuff in one place. So in one place it shall be :-)

So my friends (who don't know each other, by the way) Bethany and Christy had babies just weeks apart, and I promised them both baby quilts before they were due. Well...it wouldn't be me if a bunch of other stuff didn't get in the way (school, work...) so they got them late late late!

Christy had a little boy, but wanted unisex baby stuff. I have to admit, that's a real trick! So many kids' fabrics out there are really, REALLY gender specific. Sometimes I wish there were more gender neutral things out there. After a couple months of agonizing, I finally settled on some puppy fabric because, hey, what kid doesn't like puppies?

So that's what each block looks like. A star, variable in persuasion, I think. Anyway. They were THE DEVIL. I had to block each and every one because they were all stretched and horrible. Pieceing just isn't my forte...give me raw edge applique any day!

I was definitely happier with it once I got the blocks together. Still a little wobbly, but hey, I've done worse lol.

So here is the "finished" product. Really, it's just the quilt top. I think it turned out to be about 45" square. I love the doggies in the cars!

I did crosshatching quilting on it. Our manager at the shop, Debi, showed me an easier way to get the lines straight than what I would have done, lol. Line the painter's tape up where you want it, and put the left side of the foot along the right edge of the tape and sew. Fail-proof straight lines!

Christy and Ben were really happy with it. I got it to them just in the nick of time...a week and a half later or so they moved all the way over to Denmark.

Bethany had her little girl just after Christy had her boy. So that little cutie needed a quilt too! I ended up doing a twofer for her...she has a young son too so you can't give one something without the other! Understandable. So I made 2 quilts, one for baby sister and one for big brother.

The colors are a little skewed...they are much clearer and brighter. It's a mix of cottons and flannels. It's an open domain pattern from...some website...I can't remember...lol.

This is the Prairie Window pattern from the shop. Bethany said he likes, cars, guitars and blue....so this is what I came up with. lol. It's deceptively big. I forgot how large the lap size is! When a pattern says lap size, who knows what size it'll end up being ... it's either be like, elf sized (like Santa elf, not Lord of the Rings elf...yes, I know, I';m a nerd, haha) or Andre the Giant sized. 10 points to anyone who gets the latter reference!