Baby Quilts

I have both a niece and a nephew that are having their first babies this summer. When my generation had their children I went on a baby quilting making tear. I liked making baby quilts. They were small and fun to make, with lots of creative cute patterns to follow. I burned out on quilt making years ago after tackling a full-sized quilt, but the thought of a new generation of babies prime for baby quilts got me excited about quilt making again.

I knew that I had a stash of quilt patterns stored away somewhere. I remembered seeing them when we lived in Hong Kong, but now I couldn't find them. I kept going down into the basement and hunting through the boxes stored there "one more time" but no luck. I would decide to give up, and then take another look. Finally on my third and final expedition into the basement I found them. In a box at the bottom of a stack of boxes, in a box labeled "books" there they were.

The old patterns were yellow and musty-smelling, but still perfectly serviceable. But, they also seemed dated, and more complicated than I remembered. There was one quilt pattern that I was especially fond of, but it required hand-quilting so I decided to save it for another time. After all of that I decided to go buy some new patterns after all.

There is a very nice quilt store right around the corner from our house. The ladies at the Pine Tree Quilt Shop were very helpful. They came up with the ingenious idea of using a printed panel for the center of the quilt, and choosing complimentary colored fabric strips to frame it. After choosing the required fabric I was ready to take my purchases home and begin.

It was at this point that my aging brain ran into a little trouble. The first step was to cut out those fabric strips for the border, but I couldn't seem to calculate the lengths and widths correctly, allowing for 1/4 inch seams. I kept measuring and calculating, but finally had to pin the strips together to make sure I cut them correctly. It shouldn't have been that hard....I started worrying about incipient Alzheimer's, but it all worked out.

Now over then next couple of months two quilts should start to take shape. I've been looking at the other quilts we own, trying to decide what quilting pattern I should use once they are put together, but I don't have to decide that just yet. One thing at a time!