a Christmas Quilt is a Bowl Full of Cherries

So I made a Christmas quilt. I totally wasn't planning it but somehow I was at the fabric store and a bunch of Aneela Hoey's Cherry Christmas prints jumped into my arms and somehow made it out the door with me. (I did pay for them!) And a few days later I was making myself a Christmas quilt. Backed with minky.  Could it get any more cozy? Only when shared with a wiener dog and a cup of chai latte.

I used a quilt as you go method on this quilt - I think there are a few different types. The type I used (and I basically just winged it without looking at many instructions - as per my M.O.) was to quilt each individual block onto batting and then piece the quilted blocks together. Once I had a completed, quilted top I basted it to the minky backing and then stitched in the ditch along my block seams. In the end, I don't really think it saved me much time and the whole thing was rather bulky to stuff through my machine on account of the thick batting/block seams. This would be a good method to use if you wanted to do some really intricate or complex quilting that you felt you couldn't accomplish when quilting the piece as a whole with a regular sewing machine. But I think I'm done with this method for a while - didn't seem worth it to me.

But making a Christmas quilt totally was worth it! Randy is in love with it and it may be the warmest quilt we have ever owned. I plan to take it out of town with us over Christmas to brighten up our hotel room. In the mean time we are snuggling up underneath its cheery warmth while watching Christmas movies, drinking Chai lattes, and stroking our wiener. :)

Drunken Library Quilt

We've made a lot of quilts here at Hitched & Stitched, but until recently we had never made one for ourselves. I decided to remedy that oversight and came up with my Drunken Library quilt - so named because I think it resembles haphazard stacks of books. I originally imagined that it would be folded in thirds and draped across the foot of our bed. But anyone who has known me for long knows that I'm not what you would call a detail person and sometimes petty little things like measuring are just too much of a bother when in the midst of a creative whirlwind. I just kept adding blocks to the quilt until it "looked done" to me (and until I ran out of fabric). It turned out to be exactly the width of our bed and not an inch more - which sounds impressive but looks silly, since there was no overhang on the sides. So the quilt now resides folded and draped over the back of the lounge chair that sits in front of our bedroom window. All in all, I am quite pleased with the end product and glad to have our own quilt in our house for the first time!

Triumphant Return After a Long Hiatus

I cannot believe we haven't blogged since APRIL 30. I feel ashamed and repentant. BUT not toooo repentant to offer a long list of excuses for why we were toooooo busy, as follows:

We became Charity Race Enthusiasts and walked in three: including the River Run, the Flying Pig, and the Hyde Park Blast. Maybe someday I'll run! Maybe....

 I helped run Girl Scout Camp!

I got a hair cut!

We went to Jamaica to celebrate the anniversary of our being hitched!

And I worked on a quilt for me! (Finished photos coming soon!)

Some pretty good excuses if I do say so myself! But now we're BACK! And we have lots of fun stuff coming up this fall, including new hats, a craft room makeover, a quilt tutorial, craft swaps, and the next steps in our parenthood quest. Its good to be back. :)

Cuttin' up Baby Clothes

I started cutting up the baby clothes for the keepsake quilt I'm making for my friend. It felt somehow wrong to slice into them, even though I think the finished project will be awesome!

Baby Clothes Quilt

Look what I got this week......A bag full of a coworker's son's baby clothes! Why does this make me excited, you may wonder? Because my coworker and friend, Tricia has charged me with turning them into a keepsake quilt for her son. She's quite on top of things - her son is only a year and a half old right now. And eventually she wants me to create keepsakes quilts for her two older (3 and 4 years old) daughters too. I love the idea of preserving memories in a practical, functional way and I love a new crafting challenge. Next step: cut these suckers up!

Window Pane Aviary

Kim (from Surviving Motherhood) and I share more than our name - we are both struggling with infertility and have found a common bond in that experience, though she is dealing with secondary infertility. (Did you know that people who already have children can still experience infertility? It happens more often than you'd think - I have four long-time friends currently caught in its clutches.)

Kim's infertility struggle brought her to my little corner of the interwebz and she decided to order a baby quilt for her cousin. She wanted something in shades of purple with the baby's name added somewhere on the quilt. Not being a huge purple fan myself, I was worried I would have trouble finding fabric we both liked - and then I stumbled upon the Aviary 2 collection in lilac and kinda fell in love. With purple fabric. Who knew? And Kim loved it too. The purples are deep and and complex and paired with spring greens and sky blues. After I ordered it I kept seeing the same color palate in the early spring foliage everywhere I went.







I loved working with the fabric and the quilt top came together in no time. I LOVED using an asymmetrical pattern in the lay-out because 1) I like asymmetrical things and 2) NO SEAMS TO LINE UP! And yes - that sentiment DOES deserve all caps - especially from a quilter (like me) for whom precision does not come naturally.



Once I pieced the top together, Randy and I made a trek up to The Fabric Shack in Waynesville, OH - kind of a fabric Mecca - to find backing and binding fabric. I didn't order any from the same line because I thought: "I'll get that stuff at JoAnn's - it will be cheaper than ordering and simple to match up." FAIL. I didn't realize how difficult it is to match up shades of purple and how few aesthetically pleasing purple fabrics there are to be had. Hence the trip to The Fabric Shack - where we did find suitable options - but even there they were few and far between.

After I had the quilt front, batting, and backing sandwiched together and safety-pin basted I was feeling so in the zone that I thought it would be a great idea to try out hand quilting it. You know, for the experience. I'd sit on the couch next to Randy and watch my favorite shows and feel so connected to the quilt.



This lasted for about 20 minutes until I realized that my hand quilting looks like it was done by a blind 6-year-old.



I'll need a lot more practice before rolling out any hand quilted beauties. So out came the seam ripper and we went back to our regularly scheduled machine-stitched programming. Since the piecing on this quilt is so asymmetrical it didn't make sense to quilt along the all the seams, so I decided to stitch series of horizontal lines about 1/2 inch apart. I really like the effect and the added smoothness that comes from having no intersecting lines.

And so, with no further ado...presenting the Window Pane Aviary Quilt!











And NO Kara from My Other Car is A Crane - this is not for you! Stop asking!

I can't wait to start working on the next quilt! Anyone interested?