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Little, tiny 1" square pieces of brightly colored, varied fabrics set against white. My thinking in using really big prints in these little, tiny spaces was that each square would be unique, no two would exactly repeat.

I'm behind on my baby gifts again. And behind on posting. These babies were born in November. . . Oh, well.

For the most part, we're ready. The Christmas tree is up. Lucy helped with some of the ornaments. Little gingerbread village has survived the snackers. Stockings are hung by the fireplace with care. (This was a project three years in the making! I've had the fabric forever.) Christmas cards are in the mail. (Photography by Katherine Wallin , design from minted.com , love their skinny labels !) Neighbor gifts have been delivered. ( Recipe for peppermint bark from allrecipes.com ) Teacher gifts have been given. ( Marble magnets "how-to" on not martha .) The one thing left on my list is to finish Emmie's quilt. This is how it looked in October. This is how it looked in November. This is how it looked yesterday. It is not a hard quilt. It has just taken the back burner, but no longer! I intend to give it to my baby daughter on Christmas and it SHALL be finished. That will be my greatest accomplishment this month. Merry Christmas to all, especially to all you out there...

The quilt for Lucy's bed is done! And the transition to the big-girl bed is done! I'm soooo pleased with both.

Working on a quilt for Lucy. . . I'm totally copying this beautiful quilt from Denyse Schmidt , one of her "Pretty Square" designs that she created for Sarita Handa. It's basically a log cabin square with variations and randomness added in. . .

I know, I know. . . I'm always posting baby quilts. But that's my THANG. . . you have to know that by now. I LOVE making baby quilts. . . I've never duplicated one. I love making them each as unique and different as the babies and families I make them for. This first one is for baby Livi. The little tag at the bottom is a scrap of Japanese fabric as a special shout-out for her mom, April , who is not only my friend but a fellow Japan-o-phile and taught me this little trick of using little fabric swatch accents. . . And this one is for little baby Alden who has yet to make his arrival. . . I know, strange for me to have a quilt done AHEAD of time, they're usually late! But we had an early shower for his soon-to-be-mommy, Kate, when she was in town recently. The rugby stripes are a shout-out to soon-to-be-daddy, Eric, who played rugby for the well-known Highland High Rugby Team. The back fabric is another piece I bought when I was in Tokyo a year or so ago. The front gra...

This little white quilt with pink and orange is for Baby Layla. . . her family just moved back so we're neighbors again. They have two little boys that Lucy adores (and doesn't hit!) so we're glad to have them nearby. Someone I WISH was nearby but isn't is my sister and her family. This quilt is for my new little nephew Cody. . . he's the fourth little boy in the fam and was almost named "Bear" so I used my little bear design as an applique to represent the little quartet of brothers. While making this, I kept thinking of the old Hudson Baby wool blanket we had growing up, so beautiful and simple and striking. I think I'll be using this idea more and experimenting with different colors. With a big feild of white or cream, you could really throw any combo of colored stripes in there and it would look good!

This Denyse Schmidt quilt from the Sundance Catalog is inspiring me. . . and tempting me. It's on sale at the Sundance Outlet store not far from where I live and I practically salivate every time I see it. I really like the idea of using solid fabrics to make your own patterns and designs in quilts. Here are a few excellent examples from Land of Nod that also get my creative juices flowing: There is a whole flickr group called simply solid quilts which is also fun to peruse for ideas.

This one is for little baby Lyla . . . a lot of fun to make. Final quilt size is about 36x42". Again, Egyption cotton on the front and a fun whole-cloth print on the back. I cut a lot of strips at random widths (1 to 3"), sewed them together and then cut strips the other direction at 1.5". I pinned them to the white cotton in sort of wavy stripes, sewed it down and then snipped the edges for a raw edge look. It's machine-quilted in freestyle, unplanned waves. Oh, and add this project to my list of fun projects I want to do but will probably never get to. . . I did buy elastic thread the other day, though!

Machine pieced and hand quilted, this one is for baby Quinn. The focal point of the quilt is the floral fabric with gorgeous corals and reds and the that amazing turquoise that's just the right shade. Sorry, everyone, I picked it up in Tokyo and didn't get enough to share! Machine pieced and hand quilted. A modern baby quilt for little Macey. The white is an Egyptian cotton which makes this blanket feel so luxurious. The fabric on back is by Joel Dewberry and of course you can see some Amy Butler in the front pieces. Finished size 36 x 36". In the close-up, you can see how the hand-quilting washes up. . . I love the way it puckers and bunches, it adds so much texture and interest to the fabric, and by the way its not nearly as tedious or time-consuming as it sounds. I can hand-quilt a baby quilt in about 3 or 4 hours, that's just a couple Law&Orders. I don't use frames, I just pin it well and then sit with it on my lap in while the hubs and I spend some quality...

Yesterday was my mom's birthday. She was born on 07-07-47 at 7:07 am and weighted 7 lbs 6 oz. Needless to say, seven has always been her favorite and lucky number. There were seven of us in my family and her favorite movie was Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. July 7th was also her father's birthday. . . Last year on 07-07-07 she turned sixty and all five of us kids collaborated on a special birthday gift for her, a memory quilt with 60 squares, 12 from each kid. We all picked a border fabric we liked and then each took one of the colors within that fabric to base our squares on. Jenn had the light blue, I had yellows and golds, Shannon used greens, Missy pinks and then my brother Jon was the dark blue (by the way, Jon is far away in the land of Guam and was excused from sewing his own squares for lack of sewing machine and tools. But you should know, had he the proper resources I believe he could've completed his 12 squares with only minor coaching. He has actually sewn som...

Here is a baby quilt i just finished for a friend's new baby, Katherine Grace. It is hand-quilted, 36x36" with a beautiful Amy Butler print on the back. . . you can't go wrong if you have some AB somewhere in the quilt! Also, the white is an Egyptian cotton and combined with the high quality A.B. fabric, this feels like silk to touch, I'm not kidding.

I'm kind of playing catch-up, here. I've been meaning to post some of the wonderful and beautiful items that were hand-made for Lucy as gifts when she was born. This is a gorgeous pink and white nine-patch baby quilt made for Lucy by her Gramma Leen , my mom. My mom has always been a terrific quilter and a generous giver and loves to combine these two talents. I think this is where my love of quilting came from. Whenever we're together, we love to visit quilt shops, collect fabric and ideas for quilts and show off our current projects. As if a hand-made quilt by my mom for my daughter wasn't sentimental enough, this one has extra meaning because we got the idea for it years ago when my mom and dad were down for a visit. We went to the Church Museum together to see an exhibit on Joseph Smith and some of the artifacts that the church has from his life. There was a beautiful little wooden cradle and in it a delicate nine-patch, pink and white baby quilt. We both fell in ...