To niece, with love

All of the rectangles after the measuring and cutting

My older brother and his wife are expecting a baby girl in the end of September!  I am more than thrilled, but am already wishing I could be there to see her grow up more than I'll be able to.  I was very happy to have a serious chunk of time on my hands between my traveling and coming out to SF and decided to make a quilt for her.  I made a patchwork quilt and hand sewed some applique animals onto the backing.  I took a lot of photos of the process...just skip to the bottom if you want to see the final product!

Planning the layout

Sewing the right sides to each other

I first sewed together each individual row

Then attached the rows to each other

Then I basted the layers...sticking the front to the batting (filling) and the back to the other side.  Nanaa wanted to help

Oh wait, is this not helping?

After tying the three quilt layers together, creating the binding strip and machine sewing it to the border of the blanket, I hand stitched the binding to the back side...the only stitch you can see!

This is how B found Nanaa after we stepped out to have lunch and I just left the quilt where I had been sitting.  And yes, I washed it again after finishing it....

The finished front side

A zoom so you can see the ties...I tied instead of quilting with a machine because my level of sewing expertise does not lend itself to machine or hand quilting just yet.  I took these pics before washing, so you can still see how the glue (which comes out with the wash) is holding onto the fabric.  The finished product looked less buckled, I just didn't have time to take pics before leaving!

The finished back, complete with elephant, zebra, giraffe, and lion

And I can't help it, here's each animal by itself.  Animal outlines courtesy of Uncle B!