I Made a Quilt.

It's true I made an itty bitty quilt for Conster.  Today we took down the crib and put up the toddler bed complete with the new "Farm Quilt" and matching pillow.  I cried a little because my baby is no longer going to sleep in a crib.

I used the pattern for the farm quilt from Alicia Paulson's book An Embroidery Companion I've mentioned many times how much I like her patterns and projects and the same is true for this little number.  I did add two rows to the bottom because it didn't seem big enough and I'm glad I did it just barely covers the toddler bed.

Why I did it: I like sewing and always want to learn a new skill. I want my kids to have unique hand made things, and I find that finding cute things for boys is really difficult so I decided to make a cute quilt instead of buying a stupid monkey or truck blanket.

What I Learned:

Making an itty bitty quilt is very time consuming.  There are lots of steps.  Because this one has hand embroidered farm animals it takes a little longer (though I enjoyed that part a lot and think the animals just totally make the blanket).  While it was time consuming it was super rewarding but because it was time consuming I'm not sure I would make one bigger then this it seems like it would take forever.

Picking out fabric for a boy quilt and using almost totally scraps from my stash is super fun and super exciting.  I felt very very frugal when I was able to use up the last bits of some of my more charming fabric (mushrooms and three little pigs just to name a few.)

However, it's a good thing I used all those scraps because just the batting and backing was $30.  I did splurge a little on the batting, I got 100% cotton because I'm hoping Conner uses it a lot, I want it to breath and it's going to get washed plenty. However, if your thinking of making a quilt because the only ones you can find that are cute for a boy are from Pottery Barn Kids and seem really pricey, you may want to price out making one first (especially if you don't have a stash to bust) It might not be that much more to purchase one from a higher end retailer (especially if you won't find the project enjoyable and need a bigger size then toddler).  I used the word "especially" a lot there, I've also used the word "rewarding" a lot sorry about that.

The actual quilting part (that's when you make the little stitches in each square to hold all the layers together, it's also decorative) is the worst part.  It's very tedious and hurt my fingers (doing it in front of the television helped).

Which leads me to the fact that I learned using a thimble type thing to quilt would probably have saved my finger tips some bruising.  I also bought a walking foot for sewing the "sandwich" together and that was awesome, best $20 sewing money I've purchased (plus it looks cool).

To sum up, I'm glad I did this it was very rewarding, and while it's far from perfect I think it's really really cute.  However, I don't know that I would do it for some one I loved even a scosh less then my sons.  I mean part of what made it great was knowing they would have something hand made from me that was really unique and all those little stitches are filled with love.  I liked the different steps and found that seeing it come together was a neat feeling but I like sewing and I'm not sure I would have been able to stick with getting it done if it had been bigger (unless I wasn't doing all the embroidery before hand) and would have taken longer.  So if your wondering if you want to try something like this the answer is... I don't know either you'll love it or hate it but I hope my experience helps you make the decision.