Harlo's Quilt (my first quilt ever!)

Here it is - my pride and joy, my very first quilt.

Harlo's Quilt

I'm so ridiculously proud of this. I must say, I was never that enamoured with the idea of quilting. I don't know what changed, but suddenly I became a bit obsessed with wanting to make one. I kept seeing gorgeous,  amazing, impressive and artsy quilts everywhere online (see my board on Pinterest for a few of my favourites) and also in Sew magazine.  So, I decided to dive straight in with this nautical chevron number for my baby nephew Harlo's joint Christmas and christening gift. He has this amazing nautical bib which really suits him, and I do love a nautical print, so the idea for this quilt was born. You can spot some dress off cuts in there (red spots of my Marion dress and blue waves of my Ancient Mariner dress), but the rest were bought specially. Why oh why didn't I buy more of the pale blue anchor print and the red striped anchor print to make me some dresses out of? Error. 

As you might be able to see, the chevron pattern on this quilt is made of rectangular pieces, not triangles. I thought I'd better stick to the grain line on my first quilt. I used a mixture of "my method" (winging it) and this tutorial from Crazy Mom Quilts. This tutorial was especially helpful with how to sew the blocks together. I honestly would have fudged this up otherwise. 

I do now wish I had made those original little rectangles BIGGER. It took so blooming long to cut them all, sew them all together, lay them out.... You get the idea. But I am so chuffed with the result, that's all forgotten now. 

There were only a few "minor panic" moments during the making of the quilt. And they were these:

1) "Uh oh. What if I've not been accurate enough with my cutting and sewing? My chevrons won't match up!!" I should have more faith in my ability to fudge it and make it work on the fly. I managed with a bit of artful matching and folding to get all the chevrons to line up. Ahhhh.

2) "The quilt top looks so NICE. Am I about to ruin it with my first attempt  at quilting?!" 

3) "I bet I'm committing many cardinal sins of quilting."

4) "I've stabbed myself with a pin and BLED on this new lovely quilt. Well done, Ree."

Worry not, the blood came out. I did fine without a walking foot, and no matter how many cardinal sins of quilting I may have committed, I did end up with a quilt. 

I used a thin 100% cotton wadding by Simply Cotton, which was of lovely quality. I stitched in the ditch of my chevron design. Well, mostly in the ditch. sometimes just next to the ditch. I love the effect it creates on the back. 

Mitred corner!

So, have I been bitten by the quilting bug? Well. Kind of. I do absolutely want to make more, but not yet! I would like to make one for our bed and one for the living room sofa, but they'll be such big projects I think if better wait till after Project Wedding Dress. 

I hope Harlo likes the quilt!