Memory Quilt - with a twist!

Recently I was asked to do a very special project for a precious new arrival - and now she's arrived I can share it with you too! 

A friend of mine asked me to make a quilt for her first grandchild - she wanted a cot size quilt that could also be used as a play time / tummy time mat when the baby arrived.  Annita had some fabric of her own that she asked me to include, to give it a personal touch from Granny - and as an extra surprise, she gave me a page of doodles that the expectant mum had drawn and left at Annita's house, that she wanted incorporated into the design in some way.

The doodles had a big tree in the middle, so I used that as a centre piece with the sun in the corner to make a kind of woodland landscape scene, with some of the flowers and butterflies etc around it.

Voilà!

And here's little Nola Elizabeth, modelling it beautifully don't you think?

Memory Quilts

I really love making quilts!  They take a long time to do, but each one is so personal, there's a real sense of achievement when you finish one too.  If you haven't heard of memory quilts, they are quilts made from recycled fabrics and clothing that hold special memories for the owner. Mostly these days they're made from those first baby clothes you can't bear to part with, but anything is possible (quite fancy an old band t-shirt quilt myself...)

Below are some of the quilts I have made to date.  I'm working on a sort of memory quilt with a twist at the moment actually - more of that later!

My hands-down-favourite quilt is the one I made for my daughter.  Not strictly speaking a memory quilt, but I made it from pretty scraps of fabric I had collected, using a traditional English quilting pattern in my Liberty sewing book. The memories were more in the making with this one - it's all handstitched, I started it when I fell pregnant, and finished it just before her second birthday!  A real family heirloom... but needless to say I won't be embarking on a project like that again any time soon!

I made my first memory quilt for Oliver and his Mammy, Gemma, from Oliver's first baby clothes.  It was a learning curve, having not attempted anything like it before, but I really enjoyed picking out all the little features to create something super special. Turned out ok, don't you think?

My second memory blanket was for one of Oliver's friends, her Mummy saw Oliver's quilt and couldn't resist ordering one too... It's a bit bigger, roughly cot bed size (Oliver's was 100cm square).  I like all the girly frilly bits.