A quilt for Franka

Hello and happy New Year 2018 to everybody. I started the year with a new quilt. My friend and college's daughter hit the big first birthday yesterday and that meant that a quilt had to be created. As everybody knows a baby or toddler needs at least one quilt to cuddle up under or to play with.




So I spend the last two weekends designing, choosing fabric from my stach, assembling, sewing, quilting. And what a joy it was. As you can see my colour theme is centred around the cool tonal range, such as turquoise, blue, grey with a dash of pink thrown in now and then for good measure.



I literally tore through my entire stash to hunt for suitable fabrics and for a while it looked like a bombshell in my studio but that is all part of the fun (though the folding and ordering of said bombshell not so much).



I chose the hourglass pattern intersected with simple squares and I made sure I had a good amount of "I spy" objects to keep the little one interested and entertained.



The finished squares are all 3 1/2 inches and I started the hourglass blogs with 5 1/2  squares to ensure I had enough to square off given that anything sewn on a bias seam is prone to distortion.




I had some of these fabrics for many years now. I remember buying the flipflop fabric when my sister still lived in Bremen and I would take my nephew out in the pram and we would always pop into this  fabric store on the way to the playground. He is now 9 years old and although this is more than 6 years ago he still remembers this.




And come Cotton & Steele cats can't be missed out on the quilt together with the horses and cheeky slogans....




....and dresses and dogs and little windmills and balloons....




The quilt is bound with a teal print that echoes the colours in the quilt and gives it a nice slightly darker frame and in addition works well with the back of the quilt.



The quilt is about 42" by 49" with 84 hourglass blocks and a similar number of simple squares. I can't quite remember the number of different fabrics I used but it is in the same region.

What a great start to the year.