Room for a little one...

The girls' teacher will be going on Maternity leave at Easter, and as soon as I found out at the beginning of term, I was pulling fabrics and putting a little baby blanket on my FAL list.

I picked out all the red, white and aquas from a couple of Little Apples charm packs, and added in a few of extras to make up the numbers.

I was originally just going to use the charms au naturel, for a simple patchwork, but when I saw Fiona's tumbler quilt in issue 5 of Love Patchwork & Quilting, (you know the one!), a quick spin of the Sizzix and a mini-tumbler was born...

The backing is fleece, no batting, and I used up some more Little Apples for binding.

Simple horizontal quilting in Aurifil 2021 50wt, which I also used for piecing, as it rarely gets swapped off my machine to be honest, was all that was needed to keep it all together.

I know I had to buy the backing, from here, but at £6/m, I have enough for another little quilt or a cushion or two, so I think I can have this purchase guilt-free!

It's only a tiddler, c. 24" x 32", but I am going on the theory and experience that small babies do not need big blankets; hauling a load of baby stuff about, means the smaller the better, and this is plenty big enough for popping over the car seat, or putting on the floor for a stretch out.

The girls have said it is both 'boyish' and 'girlish', so I guess that's a gender-neutral seal of approval!

Another FAL tick then, that makes 4 out of 8 completed already, and we are almost half way through the first quarter.  Go me!

3 months and counting!

Yep, I am going to say it, 3 months time, it'll be Christmas Eve.  I am planning on being snuggled up under my Cherry Christmas quilt by now and that, is as far as my Christmas plans will probably get until the middle of December, when it will be all-out panic!

So I finished the binding on Sunday evening, and it was just so nice sitting under it that I think I would like to use fluffy fleece on all my quilts from now on!

I did light touch quilting in a matching teal Aurifil 40wt, and echoed the edges of the coloured blocks, twice.  This is more than enough to hold the fleece in place, and I bound it in a selection of scrappy leftovers - it is Christmas after all!

The pictures really don't do it justice; fleece is a nightmare to photograph, and I was busy hopping around the grass as a billion daddy-long-legs were flying around my legs!

I haven't washed it - there doesn't seem much point, as I didn't spray baste, yep, I found a dusty box of quilting pins, and with no batting, I am guessing it would just end up with it looking like it needs a good press.

Unlike regular quilting, I started at one edge rather than the middle, having pinned one half of the quilt only; after the first pass with my walking foot, I smoothed out the fleece again and re-pinned, working this way from one side to the other - it worked perfectly, no puckers or baggy bits to report, and took about an hour.

The original blanket had a stitched folded edge, so there was no fluff until I was ready to bind, and even then it wasn't too bad.  I did zig-zag the edges before putting on the binding though.  I machined it to the fleece side and then hand-finished on the top side.

So now I have depressed you about the 91 shopping days until Christmas, I'm going to skedaddle out of here quick smart, night night xxx