Definition of a baby quilt

Babies are everywhere around me these days.  Two of my local friends just had babies.  My younger sister just discovered that she is pregnant.  And last week I received a text from another friend that she is having a baby, too!  You know what that means, right?  BABY QUILTS!!!

Part of me wants to use quilts that I've already started rather than start new quilts.  I have so many UFOs that it is embarrassing.  But what makes a quilt a baby quilt?  The size?  The colors?  The pattern?  I pulled out some of my current and not-so-current projects to see what I have to work with. First, there's the blue quilt I started this week.  I've got 30 of the 50 blocks done.  It should be 50" square, or I can make it 40" x 60".  Which size would be more useful?  Which will look better?  We'll have to see.  Would this work as a baby quilt?

I started this scrappy log cabin thinking it would be a baby quilt, but then had second thoughts.  What do you think - would this work as a baby quilt?

I've got many more blocks of this version of Bonnie Hunter's Virginia Bound than I thought.  I could finish a baby top in an evening from these.  But I kinda had my eye on this one for myself...

These bright blocks Summer Breeze would make a nice baby quilt, don't you think?  The only problem is, I only have one completed block and two  nearly completed blocks.  There would be a lot of work for me to get this one finished up, but at least I had the foresight to keep the fabrics together with the blocks so I didn't use them I something else.

I've got a bunch of these I Spy blocks I've been making from novelty fabrics that come into my possession.  I guess that is always an option, but the thought of working on this doesn't excite me right now.

Maybe my flannel buzz saw blocks?  Flannel would be so soft and cozy for a baby!  But where ARE my flannel buzz saw blocks? Uh oh, UFO missing!!  It's probably for the best - I doubt I want to work with flannel during these warmer months, anyway.  Hopefully it will turn up before fall...

But look what I DID find!  I'd already started quilting this one, so I'm making an Executive Decision and declaring this a baby quilt!  It has just been bumped up to the top of my hand quilting list.

Any thoughts or comments?  I'd love to know how you approach making baby quilts.

Back in the saddle

Remember me?  I know, I've been a bad blogger.  I think about blogging often, but just never sit down to do it.  That changes today!  And I have Gail the Cozy Quilter to thank for that.  We've been blogging friends for years now, but since I live in Virginia and she lives in Canada, we'd never met.  Then, last week, she and her husband were staying in my town on vacation, and she wandered past my shop one night and put two and two together and realized she knew the shop owner.  She came in the next day to introduce herself, and I was just so tickled!  Her timing was perfect, as I was feeling a bit tired and overwhelmed, having recently returned from a trip to Spain with my mom and sisters and trying to prepare for back to back birthday parties at my shop last weekend.  Anyway, THANK YOU for visiting me, Gail, and for inspiring me to blog again!

I must say that, since opening the shop and learning to knit (I know, that sounds a bit backwards, doesn't it?  Opening a yarn shop and THEN learning to knit?  But I didn't know it would be a yarn shop when I opened, it just kinda evolved...) I've been knitting much more than I have been quilting.  That and making class samples for all my kids' sewing classes.  But last night, I was tidying my sewing room at home and realized that I couldn't properly close the drawer with the blue fabrics in it.  Honestly, I don't use blues very often.  So, what's a gal to do but make a blue quilt?  I had inspiration for a quick and easy quilt from the Emerald Waves quilt in the April/May 2014 McCall's Quick Quilts issue, and tweaked it to make it work for yardage of white that I had.  I targeted all the smaller pieces of blue in the drawer, cutting what I needed for the quilt and then cutting the rest into scrap squares for future scrap projects.  I'm happy to report that the blue drawer has now been tamed!  I got 14 of the 50 blocks I plan to make completed.  At this rate, I should be finished with the top by the end of the week!

The blue fabrics just won't fit in the drawer anymore.

See my inspiration photo?  And I cut my scraps to every size between 1.5" square and 5" square for future projects.

So far, so good.  Although I don't like it as much as the original green quilt - I LOVE GREEN!

So, that's it for now.  Gotta ease myself back into blogging, after all.  Let me close by saying that I am so amused that the quilt I featured in my last blog post LAST YEAR just sold today.  AND the dress I am wearing in the second picture of my last post is the same dress I am wearing today in honor of Cinco de Mayo.  Honestly, it is like no time has passed at all!