Color blocks for baby

I hinted in last week's WIP Wednesday that I was starting to work on a baby quilt for some friends who just added a little lady to their family. Well, in what is record time for me, I finished it this weekend!

The front:

 And the back:

I am so pleased with how it turned out. It all started when I came upon the center fabric (Beaded Curtain in Citrus from Robin Zingone's Modern collection) while perusing Hawthorne Threads' shop a few weeks ago.

I had originally envisioned it for a fun bag or something along those lines, but when I decided to make a quilt for our friends, I thought it would be the perfect focus piece. I picked up several matching solids from a local sewing store last week and chose the coral fabric from my stash for the backing. (I'd been holding on to that one for for-eh-ver and was so glad to finally have the perfect project to use it.)

Other than doing some cutting ahead of time, I managed to complete the entire thing this weekend — which is super fast for me!

I started with this tutorial from Fabricworm and tweaked it to fit the look I wanted. I decided to go with nine blocks because it turned out to be a good baby size and fit the solids I wanted to use. Matt helped me play around with the layout until we decided to place the matching color blocks opposite from one another, and I think it created a nice balance.

For the back, I went with my own look. After deciding to use just nine blocks on the front, I had an extra orange block that I thought would look great with the coral on the back. My original plan was to just use the orange block in the center with coral all around, but when I went to start cutting, I realized I didn't have enough of the coral fabric.

It turned out to be a happy mistake, though, because I love how the two extra coral and print blocks turned out. I think the backing plays really well with the front while also standing on its own. It also added a bit of girliness to an otherwise pretty gender-neutral quilt.

(Psst! Ten points if you can spot the baby in the photo above.) ;)

I originally planned to do a rainbow binding similar to what I did on Beckett's tummy time quilt, but Matt convinced me to go simpler, so I picked up on the gray in the patterned fabric and used a matching Kona solid to make the binding. I also treated myself to a bias tape maker (finally!), which made things SO much easier!

Matt also helpfully suggested that I rotate every other block so the pattern was oriented in different directions, a great modification that added some nice visual interest.

For the quilting, I used white and stitched 1/2" on each side of the ditch and then did a square around the outside of the blocks. Simple but perfect.

 

And, of course, it was only right that we recruit Beckett to try it out, you know, just to make sure it was "baby approved." He seemed to like it just fine. :)

 Well, maybe the front more than the back. :)

Congratulations, Matt and Irene! I hope Mary loves her little quilt.