Sunshine quilt, starting school and other stitchy stuff

I thought it was about time I had a little round-up of what I've been up to sewing-wise....before I forget and it never gets recorded.

My very favourite thing, and the one I was most determined to finish, is a quilt for the baby.  As soon as I selected the fabrics for it I've thought of it as the Sunshine Quilt.  And really what could be a better way to welcome a new little being than a snuggly yellow sunshiny quilt?  I've used lots of my favourite fabrics here and all but two were from my stash.  In fact I had so little of a couple that I had to very carefully plan my cutting and placement to ensure I could use them.

 I used a quilt pattern for the first time.  I saw this one from One Flew Over a while ago and thought it would work well with the fabrics I had selected.  I didn't follow it exactly, the pattern repeated some fabrics but I didn't do that.  Very simple and straight forward - the hardest part was bringing myself to cut up the log cabins to rearrange them into a scrappy effect.....but it was worth it.

The fabrics are a mix of quilting cotton, linen, flannel and double gauze and because of this, in a complete departure from my normal minimal approach, I prewashed them all - I thought otherwise I was risking really different rates of shrinkage.

The photos really don't do it justice - it was a very wet grey day when I took them.  We have had the odd better day since but I'm afraid my two-weeks-to-due-date body is in full lazy mode and I haven't made the effort to go upstairs and dig it out of my hospital bag - pathetic, I know.

I had also hoped to make a few new muslins.  I have a pretty enormous pile already - mostly thanks to Angus, the others were fairly sicky compared to normal but he really was a champion.  I remember many many feeds where, at the end, he brought up pretty much everything he'd just swallowed.....to the extent that it wasn't unusual to have to change everything he was wearing, everything I was wearing (including underwear) and, since it was often an evening feed, our whole bed linen too.  And then of course, he'd have to be fed again.  Still, I'm sure double-feeding must have helped with getting back into shape!

Anyhow, I quite fancied making a few prettier muslins to go in with my big white pile.  I reckon they might make those first couple of weeks of establishing feeding a little bit brighter (fingers crossed this time it might be easier).   I'd read (probably here I think) that Spoonflower's double-gauze was ideal for muslins tho' it is more like a single gauze.  And one lucky day I spotted they had an offer - free postage overseas I think it was.  So a yard of this pear and bird fabric made its way over from the USA plus another, completely justifiable of course, yard of girly elephant fabric (which actually is being used in the commission I'm currently working on so I wasn't too out of order - honestly, John). 
I've just backed them some of my existing muslins - so really they are a bargain (am I over-egging my justification a bit here?!).

Last Wednesday Islay started Primary 1.  I had a very cheeky excited little girl on my hands that morning.  She had a lot of fun and is still enjoying herself.  Its lovely to see her settling in so well - and just a little bit sad that she's taking that next step to being a bigger girl. 

 I had planned to make a couple of gingham pinafores but in the end only managed one (made with Oliver and S music box pattern) - and used the rest of the material to make a couple of quick and easy elastic waist skirts.

I hemmed the skirts with a strip of Westfalenstoffe (I think bought from Celtic Fusion last winter).  The gingham came from Raystitch.

I absolutely loved making this next little stitchy thing.  Aaaages ago I was lucky enough to win a baby oobee pattern from the lovely Leslie at onegirl (and bad enough to forget to blog that I had won it).  I have been reading Leslie's blog for a while but had been a bit shy about commenting until she mentioned that she was planning to fly with her two little girls, by herself, from Australia to visit her family in Canada.  I've made several solo-with-kids trips to South Africa to visit my parents so thought it was something I could usefully comment on - unlike sewing where I'm very much a beginner in comparison.
I decided to buy one of her baby oobee fabric packs which includes fabric for the oobee's body, ears and wadding for the quilt.  I didn't think I'd be able to find natural fleece for the body here and wanted to avoid synthetic.

 The pattern is incredibly straight-forward and easy to follow.  I thought I'd have fun with the little quilt and use scraps to make it patchwork.  She is now carefully packed away in her bag with her quilt and pillow - to be given to Islay when the baby arrives (the boys haven't been forgotten - we have a watch each for them.  We've had a run of bad luck with watches and hopefully these new ones will withstand my rough little boys a bit better)

I finally finished bee blocks for Kerry in our Fresh and Funky Bee - I have to confess that I'm still not caught up yet, but I'm getting there. 

 And finally, at the beginning of the summer (crikey that seems like moments ago but was actually a good few weeks ago now) I finished a commission for a toddler girl quilt.  It ended up being quite different from the initial plan as my customer had a bit of a change of heart part way through.  The end result is a fun little quilt with lots of different animals and patterns for her daughter to look at.

So, what is planned next???  I'm fairly well through a commissioned baby quilt that I hope to finish before the end of this month - and before our baby arrives.  I have a couple of bee blocks to finish.  And ideally  I'd like to make a couple more baby things.....but they are not essential and are really more of a hope than an expectation.  Of course there's numerous other things to do, along with normal daily life, but I won't bore you with them.

Fingers crossed all will be well, things will get ticked off my list and, at some point, we'll get to meet a healthy little baby.