My nephew, Thatcher, was born a few weeks before Christmas, so I knew I needed to make him a quilt! My parents decided to come visit early in January, so that made a great way for me to get the quilt to him! I was happy to pull out the fabric I had been waiting to use and get to work on his tiny baby quilt!
The first thing I did was decide on the fabric. I had a small stack of coordinating flannel fabrics that I knew would make cute baby boy quilt. Thankfully I had bought another yard or so of another coordinating fabric to add to it, because there were enough squares to make a hand towel size! Ha! It would have been tiny!
I decided on the disappearing nine patch pattern because it's super easy and my favorite to do! So I sewed all the patches into 9 patch squares to start. That just means I made a row of three, did that three times, then sewed it together to make a nine patch block.
Iron the seams flat to one side on the back (quilting is the only time I ever take out my iron in life). Then comes the nerve wracking part. All those nine patches that you sewed together, you will now cut in half!! So find the middle of the middle square, line up your ruler, and cut down the center with your rotary cutter (or scissors). Turn each side piece to the center of the middle piece and cut again, right down the middle.
Sit back and wonder what you've done, but just wait for the magic! You should end up with 4 blocks cut from each 9 patch block.
Decide how you want to sew your quilt together with all the blocks. The designs are limitless with this block. You can make them all point the same direction, point different directions, intersect in the middle, etc. I tried many different ways and finally decided to just do random and try not to get any two patterns of fabric next to each other.
I decided to do a plain back for the quilt, which is not something I usually do. I added his name to the back with my embroidery machine. I love the way it turned out. I then took a few weeks off from quilting and had it just sitting in my craft room...until I realized the next day was when my parents would be here, so I frantically finished it up - getting the quilt sandwich, quilting, and binding all done!
I did my usual all over free motion (stippling) to quilt it together. This is my favorite, but it definitely eats up the thread! The end result turned out really cute! I'm very happy with it and was glad to pass it along to him!
Even Thatcher was happy with the final result of the quilt...although he doesn't look very happy in this picture! Ha!
Are you interested in visiting Panama to learn more about moving here? Check out Panama Relocation Tours if so. This tour will take you to many cities in the area where expats have settled and introduce you to many helpful people. Each tour is 5 nights and 6 days across the entire country (and you get to meet me)!
