Baby Blocks Quilt

i'm a lazy quilter.  can i say that?  i love quilting.  the tiny parts and pieces KILL me, though.  sew a string of tiny squares together?  it...takes...too...lonnnnnng.

and then i found strip piecing.  and then i found chain piecing.  and then i put them together and i could DO THIS ALL DAAAAYYYY.

i don't know if you've heard of this little site called pinterest?  i've found so many piecing pins there.  don't follow my quilt board.  i'm embarrassed at the amount of pins.

so.  strip piecing.  it's so awesome.

i also have a problem with collecting fabric.  i buy fabric, and then i have a hard time cutting it up.  this is why so many promised projects take me so long.  it's too pretty to cut up.  once i cut it up, it's all gone.  what if i cut wrong and the fabric isn't available anymore, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

blah blah blah.

so i made this quilt.  and omg, i can't find the pins that got me cutting fabric!  **updated.  whew!  i found it.  of course it's from the purl bee.  i saw these tiny pincushions and figured i could spare a few squares (heh) to see what these fabrics looked like together.**

so i'll begin.  is this a tutorial?  i don't know.  no.  it's pictures with words.

 i had this fabric for another project.  two projects.  i thought they would go well together, but i didn't have the balls to cut the fabric.  and i saw this pin for small pincushions and thought i could just cut up a LITTLE fabric and it would be okay.

sooo many pictures! 



i started out with 2" strips.  i laid them out in no particular order.  this was just going to be a test run.  for something small, like maybe a pillow?

and sewed them together.

and then cut them up, again, two inches.

and then thought i'd add muslin.  i had no set plan for these at this point.  maybe i would make squares, who knows.  i didn't know.

chain piecing.

and then i cut THOSE up.  and played around with the pieces until i liked the way they looked together.

and then i thought to myself...this could be an easy baby quilt! i know people with babies!

and so i put them together.  and then made more strips.  and then cut those up.

i have a makeshift design wall in my sewing room.  haha! sewing room.  it's my dining room.  i hung up curtain rods and then bought a bunch of felt.  i should make it more permanent, since there are no objections!

i stopped adding the muslin via chain piecing and just added it in after the blocks were formed.

 

while making this blanket i caught up on the walking dead and watched "butter".  really cute movie, butter.

 i like the way threads look when they're all lined up in seams.

adding muslin borders.

before "squaring" it off.  "squaring" is in quotations, because i can never make a perfect square of my quilts.  they're always a little off!

i found the backing i liked.

trying the taping to the floor technique with a small blanket. i think i'll use it for larger blankets.

back, batting, quilt top.

quilting lines.

soft.

i lined up the quilting lines with the diagonal fabric.
 

more quilting lines.

binding!

i love the way a folded quilt looks.

aaaaanddd.... the finished (crooked-ish) product.  i signed my name in the lower right.

Lessons learned:

while i like the look of the rectangular 2x4 blocks, i think i'll go with a 4x4 block next time.

i cut the binding into 2" strips, staying with the 2" strip theme.  it worked, i was able to get it around both sides of the quilt, but next time i'll give myself another inch to play with.