Jun 15, 2011

My Very First Quilt or The Great Thing About Rainy Weather

It's been rainy and miserable here for most of the week, so as a result the girls and I have been stuck inside.  Even though we're all suffering from a particularly nasty strain of cabin fever, it's been good in a sense that we've been able to hang out and do some crafty things together.

I was inspired recently to give quilting a go, and I thought I would ease myself in with a little quilt for one of Katherine's dollies (which Katherine has named "Katherine Ann Elspeth" funnily enough).  Katherine loved helping me with this - which was great, as it was really a good excuse to get her involved after spending the last few days as MIA Mummy while I tried to complete my niece's birthday projects.  Katherine raided my scrap bin for some pretty fabrics we could piece together for the quilt.  I cut out a bunch of little squares and rectangles, then Katherine helped me do the "special puzzle" to try and fit all the bits together.  It took us a while as we didn't work to a pattern, we just kind of pieced it together to try and get all the parts to fit, and make sure that the colours all went together too.  This was the trickiest part!


Our 'special puzzle'

I was worried about sewing all the layers together as I don't have a walking foot, and the only other attempt at quilting anything - a pot holder of all things - ended disastrously. If you're the kind of person who thinks that wrinkled fabric is a disaster, which obviously, I am. I pinned the hell out of the quilt (couldn't be bothered basting), and set my presser foot to the lowest pressure, and everything went pretty smoothly.




I intended to use the backing to bind the quilt but there wasn't as much backing as I thought once I'd quilted it, so I had to make a bunch of bias binding, and use that instead.




Anyway, it's very rough - all cut by hand, and totally not square - the only time I pulled out a ruler or marker was to make the bias binding - but dolly has a quilt!




The other thing I finished today was this cute little bag to go with my niece's birthday dress. I am really happy with how this has turned out, as I really just made it up as I went along. Katherine has already put in an order for one of her own. Might have to get her back into that scrap bin again...




Yes, she's in her PJs... it was raining and miserable, the perfect excuse to wear them all day!


Katherine did her own craft today too - these cute little fairy fridge magnets. I picked them up a while ago in one of those boxed activity sets from Lincraft, and had them stashed away for one of those days when colouring in and play-dough just won't do. Today was that day!  She had great fun mixing up the plaster, pouring the moulds, painting them and sticking little magnets on the back. Mummy helped, of course.




1 comment:

  1. The quilt is great. What a great project for you to do together. I love the little bag too, so cute.

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