Hey I Didn't Know You Quilted...

I didn't know I could either. Every year, Brad's brothers and sisters exchange Christmas gifts to the family of one of their siblings. This year, we had this cute family:

Dan, Abby, Kate, Lucy and Sadie

Then I came up with the ambitious project of making them a quilt. I have never pieced a quilt before, the whole idea scares me. There is so much precision and exact measuring involved, the whole idea gave me hives. I asked my hurricane-of-creative-energy-friend Kristen if she would be willing to teach me. Before I knew it, I was sitting on her floor looking at dozens of cute fabrics and making trips to specialty fabric stores and trying to figure out endless combinations of how the fabrics would go together. I also decided to make this my Individual Worth project for my Personal Progress. In the end, I came up with this:

I love the colors, I call it the happy quilt. I spent about a month and a half working on the quilt, fininshing just days before Christmas. Kristen made a similiar quilt excecpt that she had it machine quilted and I hand quilted mine (with a LOT of help from my dear mom). I even stitched Dan and Abby's initials on the center of the quilt. I thought it would give it a little more personal touch. Plus if I had their initials on the quilt, it would make it harder for me to keep the quilt for myself (which I was sorely tempted to do).

(I don't know why blogger keeps rotating this picture)

I was hoping that taking the picture without a flash so it would show the colors more true to life.

Back of the quilt.

I have always admired and respected someone that could quilt but now that I've actually done one, my admiration and respect has increased tenfold. I don't think I could have finished this quilt without Kristen guiding me through the process. Plus those rotary cutters scare the daylights out of me. I had a lot of fun making the quilt, piecing it with Kristen was a laugh a minute and I really liked talking with my mom while we sat around the quilting frame. Will I quilt again? Probably, but not right now.