The Quilt That Started It All...

In 2012, we had a baby and moved across the country from CA to NJ.  In the midst of it all, we wound up living with my parents for a couple of months due to lease-timing issues.  These months happened to include the birth of our son.

This was my mom's first grandchild.  To say she was excited is a crazy understatement.  She made a couple of baby quilts, which were quite simple and came together quickly.  Looking at them, I got inspired to make a quilt too—but a queen size one for my own bed.  

My previous quilting experience consisted of making a throw-size quilt top with my mom when I was 10 years old as part of a Colonial America school project.  So I didn't really know what I was doing, but I really, *really* wanted to do it.

We picked a pattern called, I think, "Picket Fence" (although there seem to be many different patterns with that same name).  My mom had seen it in a magazine the previous year and cut it out and saved it. 

After several unsuccessful runs to fabric shops, we decided to make it using the same fabric line used in the magazine: Robert Kaufman's Daisies and Dots.  Knowing what I know now, this pattern was obviously designed to use a Jelly Roll, but we blithely managed to order ⅛ yard cuts and cut our own strips.  

I was cutting strips all through my early-stage labor.  (All in all, I had 40 hours of labor ahead of me, so there was plenty of strip-cutting time!!!)  My mom and I then pieced, basted, quilted, and bound it during my maternity leave, while I was living with my folks.  So I think of this as my maternity leave quilt.  

It now sits on our bed.  I love the fresh, bright colors.  And NJ in the winter can be pretty dark, so it's nice to have so much white in the room.  I put a border on the quilt, using a pattern that I now add to many of my quilts: narrow white border to set off the pieced center, then wider colored strip, then white, then a binding.  It gives the quilt a nice frame, and adds about a foot in each dimension.

The quilt is backed in a sheet from Target---super easy!  No piecing!  And the sheet is a cotton-polyester blend, which gives the quilt added strength so it can last a long time.

The quilting is very simple stitch-in-the-ditch along one of the diagonals.  This was my first time quilting anything, so I wanted to keep it simple.  And it was *slow* (because I was a nube), so I only did one direction before I lost patience.

Here's the obligatory baby-on-quilt photo (from > 6 months ago, so he looks very small and round!).  Seems only right, since this little guy was there at the very beginning of the quilt (or should I say, this quilt was there at the very beginning of this little guy!).  Either way, they have the same birthday!

While I was making this quilt, my best friend and her partner announced their engagement.  So of course, I decided I had to make them a quilt too!  And that's how it all began...