No. 8: Make baby quilts again

No. 8: Make baby quilts again
The Twinkie Quilts, finally.

I used to make baby quilts all the time. They are small projects allowing unbridled use of color and pattern and everyone loves them. My kids have multiple quilts each. But life got in the way and my sewing machine broke and-excuses, excuses, excuses- no quilts were made at our house for a good ten to fifteen years.

Aren't these wonderful prints? 

Inspiring.

I'd been wanting to get back to making them and goodness knows I have had plenty of great nieces and nephews to inspire me.  (Thirteen BEFORE these two were born, to be exact.)
But it took some very wanted and very hard fought for twins to finally get me motivated.

I boldly dove into Colby's fabrics first 

without really thinking things through.

April 5 brought Clara and Colby into our extended family.  The quilts weren't quite ready and really neither was Clara. She spent her first weekend in NICU but finally got sprung in time to go home with her brother.  The twins are tiny and darling and doing well and yesterday I took the finished quilts to them.

Colby, left, and Clara.

It must have been a hard night.

In retrospect, deciding to make TWO quilts at the same time that I also decided to draw every day for a month was not my smartest decision.

 I started on Clara's with a bit more of a plan.

My friend Cherrilla deserves an award for talking me through much of this, reminding me of tricks and tips and peppering me with design ideas. She makes quilts for fun and profit and hers put mine to shame.

Lots of ironing goes along with all the sewing.

In fact, I would like to put out this disclaimer right now: there are a million fiber artists who can and do out-sew, out-quilt and out-design me.  My goal has never been to the quilter's guru or win the International Quilt Festival Blue Ribbon.  Mostly I just want to make fun little quilts that embody my joy at the arrival of new little people.

The finished projects. 

Side by side. 

They both have the same trim and both have a green bird in the right hand corner.

Because, duh, they're twin quilts.

And here are the delightful new little people that got my "first time in forever" quilts.

Colby, Great Auntie Me, Clara

It was so much fun to hold two babies at once but I cannot imagine how 

overwhelming it must be to be their mama and daddy.

Clara was so impressed she fell asleep.

I think that is an appropriate response to receiving a quilt.

So No. 8 is complete but not over.    

Clara and Colby's Aunt Allison is expecting a baby in November.  

I foresee more quilts and more great nieces and/or nephews in my future.

Eek! They were starting to wiggle.