A Stella Quilt for a Baby

Let me tell you a little story about a quilt that did not go at all like I expected.

I have a lot of cousins — somewhere around 30 first cousins on just my mom's side of the family — so I decided that I would make one quilt for each cousin when they had their first baby. Lots of my cousins have had kids (see here, here, here for a few of them) and my cousin Adam and his wife are expecting their first child next month.

Normally I love making baby quilts and my cousin-in-law loves purple (my favorite color!) so I was extra excited for this quilt. I did a little look at her baby registry and saw some pretty muted, dusty pinks and purples so I decided go that route and make a Stella Quilt since I haven't made the baby version of that pattern.

All was well and good with the quilt top and then I looked in my backing fabric stash. It is pretty extensive and I have lots of options, but nothing was right. I didn't want to buy a new fabric, because I have so many backing fabrics already so I decided to just make it work and picked a cute pink minky fabric and basted the quilt. When I was rolling the quilt to start quilting, I saw the backing right next to the quilt top and . . . oh no! The pinks on the back were too bright. I just couldn't do it!

For the first time ever, I un-basted a quilt.  

I did a little fabric shopping online and found a cute voile print that was from the same collection as one of the prints on the quilt top (Hello Bear by Bonnie Christine). It is kind of a light tan with just a hint of light pink. Once the fabric arrived, I basted the quilt (again!) and sat down at my machine to start quilting.

And then my walking foot broke. 

I drove to a local Janome dealer and bought a new foot, took it home, and started quilting. Only this new foot put more pressure on the quilt and caused pulling with the quilting. At this point I almost gave up. 

My seam ripper got a little workout as I pulled out all of these stitches and macgyvered my broken walking foot work for at least this project. 

The quilt turned out super cute and sweet and I mailed it to my mom to take to the baby shower. 

I tell you this story just to remind you that no matter how many quilts you have made, sometimes things go awry. Also that if you aren't happy with a choice you made on your quilt, it's ok to to un-baste an entire quilt even if it's not fun.

Baby quilts are still my favorite — especially purple baby quilts.