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Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Amylouwho's cute quilt...years in the making...

Amy from the fun Amylouwho blog sent me this darling quilt. I love the story. So sweet, she did it for the fall online quilters festival. She has cute little animals she embroidered when she was a young girl. It will be a cherished quilt for sure!  Be sure to check out her site, and her linky parties on Friday's are always full of inspirational projects.

Not only is it cute, this little quilt has a great story!
When I was about 12, I embroidered these blocks for a church project. I don't remember how long it took me, but I'm sure it was a while. The idea is that they would be made into a baby quilt for when I grew up and had my own kids. Well, you know what happened. They sat in my sewing box for about 20 years (that long? really?).


Well, when I got pregnant with my first, my mom and I decided to resurrect the old project and breathe some new life into it. So we went through her stash of 40s reproduction prints and decided to use a lot of different fabrics so it would be more gender-neutral. So we cut out the sashings, and I managed to sew that main part together.


Then my mom took over again and she put on the borders.

My Aunt Mary quilted it on her long-arm machine, my mom sewed the binding on, and I handstitched it down.


I finally finished it a few months before my SECOND was born. (Remember that procrastinating problem?) Even when we got it all put together it still took me forever to sit down and do the handsewing. I really didn't think I would enjoy that part very much - it's grown on me since.

Thanks so much to my mom who helped not just with the sewing and cutting but with the overall look of the quilt and to Mary for doing such a great job on the quilting. I'm really pleased with how it turned out, and it's so cute I'm not sure I really want anyone spitting up all over it. So for now it's hanging on the wall in the playroom.

What's funny (or sad, you decide) is that it took over 20 years, 3 people and many locales to get this thing done. Here's a list of the places it's been worked on:
embroidery - Annandale, VA
Sashing cut - Draper, UT
Sashings sewn - Oceanside, CA (thanks Allyn for letting me use your machine back then!)
Borders sewn - Draper, UT
Machine Quilting - Tooele, UT
Initial binding sewn - Draper, UT
Final handstiching - Stafford, VA

At least it started and ended in Virginia - but sheesh, what a trek. I am kind of glad we didn't put it together way back then - I think the fabrics we had available to us recently make it really cute - who knows what 80's influence would have been at work had we completed it back then! But I love that I have something that my mom, aunt and I worked on together.




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6 comments:

amylouwhosews said...

thanks ladies! I do love this quilt!

Becky said...

Yea! I know what it's like to work on a quilt that long :-). Here's to finishing them! Feels great doesn't it?! I love it. It turned out so cute! It takes a village to make a quilt? LOL

Charity said...

I think this is adorable. I love the embrodered blocks. Not sure I could have done that well at 12. The procrastination only adds to the enjoyment by all family members. Treasure it all!

Aunt Spicy said...

Wow! Seriously, wow! You are a rock star!

grammajill said...

its super cute! Love the embroidered designs.

9patchnurse said...

Oh I love it! And it does have a great story. You are so right about the fabrics. Definitely better without the 80's influence. I used to embroider and I really need to get back to it.