Oliver's Heart Quilt.

This quilt was inspired by this mini quilt -  I'm not sure who the original artist was but a google search brought me to THIS WEBSITE.  

Melissa wanted these two sleepers to be the "focus" of the quilt.  But since the logos are right next to the zippers, we decided that the best thing to do would be to make each onesie into a "half" heart, and then put them together side-by-side to make up a whole heart.     I took out 3 rows of stitches to try to get more room for the heart shape.    

 It still didn't look quite right. . I think because it was the biggest heart and right in the middle.   So then we decided to make them into two separate hearts.  

After some wiggling around,   we came up with THIS design -  I also added some more color, reduced the size of most of the hearts, and used the booties from the sleepers to add depth and more color.    -  much better!  

The top was complete, but I felt it really needed "something". . . so I decided to try to do a Mock Trapunto technique.    I used a thick polyester batting, and densely quilted in the background area and in and around all the hearts and applique shapes.  

I used stippling in the large open areas and pebbling inside the smaller areas inside the heart and around the text.    
Starting from the outside edges first and going around the edges.    I stippled first, and then once I got to the inside of the hearts, I started pebbling.    This pushes all the batting down, and into the open areas.    Then I outlined around each heart, and they magically POOF UP, making it look like you took a long time stuffing each heart or adding extra batting.  

 I didn't have quite enough of the fabric and they were sold out, so I pieced the backing and made it into a double-sided quilt.   

 Here you can see how poofy the applique shapes are - and also the quilting on the back.

Brady's Baby Clothing Quilt & Sammy's Baby Quilt

I can make your own custom baby clothes quilt-
**See my facebook page for ordering and pricing information**

Two finished for the last few weeks.  I wanted to share them both with you guys here.
First, I finally got the opportunity to make a quilt out of baby clothes!  There was a mixture of knits, wovens, and fleece.   AND, since the clothes were so small, it was especially difficult to capture the WHOLE shirt logo without cutting into the arm seams.   BUT, we did it, and I think it turned out awesome!

 That's MOM (Beth) on the left, with her son Brady. . and that's me on the right.  We're in Jacqueline's back yard.. .she is Brady's grandmother (Beth's Mom.)  Her back yard is perfect for photos!!

Here's a photo of the back of the quilt, I used leftover woven fabric from Brady's little dress shirts, on the back.  Strip pieced them, and then added them in between two layers of Xtra wide quilt fabric!

And I just wanted to share with you my graph for this quilt.  As I've said before, every SINGLE quilt, for me, starts with a graph.  Graphing out my quilts is especially important for T-shirt quilts. I measure each block, then write in a brief (and I mean REALLLLY brief) description of each shirt inside the block.   Since we were doing BABY shirts, these blocks were especially SMALL. . making it especially CHALLENGING!   I thought this graph was really funny, and I'm glad noone else has to decipher it but me! LOL


My next quilt was a quilt for our church choir director Jack.  He recently had a baby boy and named him Sammy.   He told me to make whatever quilt I wanted, but gave me these specs:   Colors- blue and brown, Theme: Traditional.   When he told me this, I immediately thought:  SCRAPPY!!!   So, I went to the trusted QUILTVILLE site to look for a fun pattern to use for scraps.   I have always been drawn to her PLAYING WITH JACKS pattern, and so it was.

 I pulled out my 2.5" strips of Browns, Neutrals, and Blues.

 Here are all of my "jacks on six" or "double x" blocks finished and pressed!  They don't look like much now do they?  haha

 Here is the completed center top

 Top complete with borders!

 I REALLLLLY had fun quilting this quilt!!  I just love quilting patchwork !   And surprisingly, I don't get to do it very often!

 I stippled in all the neutral areas so that the "Xs" would POP!  Then I went in and did a one-line outline quilt all around the rest of the patches.

 I fused Sammy's initials onto the back of the quilt.   I did this after I made the sandwich, and just quilted over them!

 I tried something different with the feathers this time around - I quilted my feathers, and then did an echo stitch back down to the starting point.  I really REALLY like the way it looks, and plus, it's easier!  YOu don't have to either make a stop, and then reposition, OR follow your feather vein all the way back down!

 I really like this photo of the quilt - it shows off the quilting AND the back.

 Thank you hubby for helping me photograph (it's like pulling teeth God-love him!)

 We got a little bit of sunshine on the quilt, showing off the feathers!