Christmas

In October 2009, I decided that I was going to learn how to quilt AND that I would be giving quilts as Christmas presents. I bought a quilting magazine called "Easy Quilts", flipped through and found a pattern that I really loved called "Serendipity", and went straight to my local quilt shop.

My first quilt went to my friend, Charmain. I used "Serendipity" to make this one. I used pink and green fabrics because her sorority colors are pink and green.

The second went to my step-mom. She loves the color peach.

The third quilt went to Charmain's daughter. Her nickname is "Ladybug". I made this one without a pattern.

The last one of 2009 went to my sister. Her bedroom has a blue accent wall. This is a traditional rail fence design.

This year, I wanted to make quilts for my Mom and Dad for Christmas. Before I could create what I had in my head for them, I made one for my grandma. I had some 1930's reproduction fabrics in my stash and saw a picture of a quilt I really liked. I put this together by guessing about the construction of the quilt in the picture.

Kaitlyn got another quilt this year. She really liked "Ladybug" from last year and had to be convinced that it wasn't a toy and should be left on her bed. Since she has a love of rainbows, she got a rainbow quilt. The pattern was inspired by a piece of fabric that I saw online. The striped side was supposed to be the front, but at the last minute, I decided to put her name on what was the back, and then it just made more sense for the back to become the front.

I had a hard time selecting fabrics for Dad's quilt. Surprisingly, it's pretty difficult to find masculine fabrics and it was even harder to find fabrics that were just right for my Dad. He really likes brown, so I went with brown and gold. Both Dad and I are pretty sentimental, so I decided to put the names of his family and his favorite scriptures on the quilt. The quilt is machine stitched, but the names and scriptures are hand embroidered. He loved it.

Mom's quilt came with a lot of challenges and as a result, it is still a work in progress. The cap from a highlighter marker came off and made a huge stain on the fabric. I was able to get the yellow stain out, but in the process, created another mess.

I eventually got that out and was able to finish the hand embroidery.

The angel is appliqued. I'm still bothered that, as of now, it's not as big as I want it to be. We'll see how it evolves.

Right now, I'm thinking that I will not be making quilts for Christmas next year. I said that last year, so...lol.