Ever since I made Reagan’s baby quilt over a year ago, Caleb has been asking for me to make him a quilt. So, I thought his birthday was a good time to do it.
He went with me to pick out the fabric, and you know he had a blast with it! He got so excited with every fabric. There is two toy story fabrics in the mix. One pattern I thought was “too big” for my size squares, so I was trying to encourage him away from it. He had to have it because it had ONLY Buzz on it. Buzz needed his own fabric. I understand. 🙂 This quilt is definitely my Caleb’s, and I love it for how he loves it.
I had never made a rag quilt before. I have sewn other quilts but never this style. After “pinning” several quilts on pinterest and seeing one a friend did…it pushed me over the line to try a new technique. I LOVE it! This style of quilting is SO much easier! It hides all your flaws! If you want to see a quick tutorial of a quilt sample I scanned before starting mine look at Imperfect Homemaking.
Caleb saw that I had cut all three layers of my squares (the front fabric, the stuffing, and the back fabric-shown in picture 1). It took forever. I didn’t get why it took so long since my friend, who made one of these said it was no big deal. Turns out my quilt was huge and I had no idea! I then had to sew an “X” across the middle of each set of the three layers of fabric (picture 2). I think I watched a Mandy Moore movie during this step.
At this step is where I would like to say my husband was out-of-town for six days prior to Caleb’s birthday, and in there I hosted a playgroup party with a few of Caleb’s buddies at our house. We had been busy! At 8:00pm the night before his birthday, I had still not finished cutting and sewing all the squares together. I was tired and not sure if this thing was gonna come together in time. I decided I would at least try or make it through one movie while sewing.
The hardest step for me was sewing the squares into strips (picture 3). I like order and patterns, but I thought this quilt would be even cooler all random, so I stretched myself. Ha maybe that is one reason why I’m proud of it. It’s so unlike me! Once the rows were sewn together (picture 4) I than laid them all out to sew together (picture 5). At this point, I had to stay up and finish it! I am proud to say at 2:10am I sewed the last stitch (picture 6). I was exhausted and wanted to curl up with the thing! Ha it’s still not done. I’m suppose to go back and fringe the seems with scissors and then wash and dry it, so it fringes more. Caleb doesn’t notice that, so we are both happy with it for now!
THE REVEAL: On Caleb’s birthday (more pics coming soon), I let him open one present before school, but the rest we were waiting till after school and “rest” time so Matt would be home. While Caleb was in school, I went to the airport to pick up Matt. After getting Caleb from school and going to a special lunch, we came home and all had to crash. Matt had worked till 2:00am the night before as well and then caught a 6:00am flight home to be able to be home by the time Caleb got out of school. On our way to our beds for naps/rest time Caleb squeals “mommy!! My quilt!!! Can I open that one before?! I need it!” It made my heart pretty much leap from my chest.
My boy had faith in me…even when I did not. Such innocence or trust in his mommy to know I would have that thing done for him. I love that! He was thrilled by it!! He kept hugging it and telling me how much he loved it…and me. I was thinking it was a blanket. Oh no! He ripped his comforter off his bed and said he didn’t need it anymore. It is his new bedspread.
Have I told you how much I love this kid?! He is awesome and brings my heart so much joy! So, although I made the quilt for him, the real gift is all he did for me by allowing me to love him in this way. Life is good!
Erica, those pictures are fantastic! Caleb looks absolutely overjoyed 🙂 Love it!