The Kiddo’s First Quilt

It’s been quite a long time in the making, but the kiddo finished his first quilt!

And he’s pretty excited about it. We was super excited in the beginning, then lost interest and only kept working on because I’d nag him about it. Until he started to see it was almost done! Then he got reenergized about it! Not that that’s too unusual even with us grown-up

He started back in June of 2013. I wasn’t working my full time professional and was enjoying some time in a little quilt shop. I’d close the shop and run pick him up from preschool and then we’d head back to the shop. One day he got really excited about making his own quilt. We picked out the fabric and step a stool for the pedal, a bunch of cushions in the chair and he was off. For a few rows anyway….

Then we got it back out again about 5 months later… And there were a couple of other rows added on between 2013 and 2017, but not too much!

Last year he finished the piecing of both the top and back. Yes, he did it all himself! He even helped me baste the top, back and batting! And then he tried out quilting…

Before really quilting! I helped move the quilt and keep it on the table, but he did it all himself!

The only thing I did was the binding. He picked the color, but I put it on.

At one of our Seattle Modern Quilt Guild meeting nights, Dad was out of town, so he ahd to go with me. And he had just finished the quilt, so it was perfect timing for him to participate in Sew and Tell! I have to say, I love that little smile!

The back we decided not to do a lot of piecing! I didn’t want to loose him again, so we went with not a lot of piecing!

And he made his label! I told him what most people put on labels and he went with his name and year. Sweet and Simple!

We were trying to get one made for Quiltcon, but didn’t make it. But he does already have a design for his next quilt. Penguins….

 

 

 

 

You’re Cool, Valentine! Printable Penguin Valentine Tags

Who loves penguins??? We do! Who loves stuffies? We do!

I like to make class Valentines about something the kiddo is excited about and not just about candy! Once we did Astro-Ordinary crayons. And another year we did Legos.  We also did Pokémon Valentines, but I lost the pictures of those… I need to find them… Anyway… Back to the penguins!

We didn’t want to do a penguin with a heart sewn on it or glued on it. And we wanted him standing up, so we finally narrowed it down to a Christmas penguin.

We ordered these little guys online. But of course, their scarfs would not do for Valentine’s Day. Nope! So we took them off. They were sewn on, but only with one stitch or so. Easy to get off. We used the Christmas scarf as our template for the red Valentine’s Day scarfs.

And I designed the tags. You’ve probably seen my Quilt Design a Day ‘sketches’. To make those I use an app called Assembly, so I thought it would be fun to try to design the Valentine tag in the app as well. And we loved the way it turned out!

Then came the assembly line. We actually added a tiny ribbon to the tag, slipped the scarf through it and then double knotted the scarf on the penguins!

Soon enough we had a ton of Valentine’s Day gifts for the whole class and some special others.

You can download the penguin Valentine tags for yourself here. I have two sizes. First I made the 3″ tags (9 to a page) and then realized it was just too big. So then I made a 2″ tag (12 to a page) and they were just right!

Download the 3″ Penguin Valentine’s Day Tags here.

Download the 2″ Penguin Valentine’s Day Tags here.

These are for personal use only! Thank you!

 

Have you decided on your Valentine’s for this year?