its been awhile.

Hello Blogosphere.  We're back, full of updates of all sorts and ideas for blogs that should make up for our time away.  It was the holidays, I started a new job, we went to California, we've been house hunters.  So, we've been relatively busy, I'd say.  But more on all that later.

Back in September, I started collecting fabric that would be the inspiration for a quilt that I decided to make for my sister Kayla for Christmas.  I thought I could dare to match other fabrics to the inspirational Amy Butler's Midwest Modern line, but I failed.  So, luckily there are quite a few colorways and patterns in this line, that I just chose about 12 different fabrics to go with.  I used the Lotus quilt pattern (free online from Amy's website: www.amybutlerdesign.com).  This required 198 - 7.5" x 4.5" pieces.  After cutting those out, I had the task of arranging them, trying my darndest not to have too many repeats in a particular area of the quilt.  Here is that process (half the quilt):
Then to sew all the 11 pieces of each column together:Then to sew all the columns together, basting the quilt top to the batting to the backing.  And then some hand quilting around 58 squares (this part took me the longest and got me closer to the deadline than I had hoped...).  Then the easy and most satisfying part - puting the binding on and getting it done 2 days before Kayla came home from Canada.

This is her reaction:

I'm pretty sure those are tears welling up or something?!?! Hah, just kidding.  The poor girl was probably thankful to just have another blanket to keep her warm in the cold winters of Canada.  But really, she loved it!  I was slightly worried by the pinks that I put in there.  I backed it with some mustard yellow fabric that is more in line with her color palette tastes.  Here are some more pics of the final piece:

This was the ONLY handmade Christmas item I made.  Next year there will be more.  It sure is a good feeling to finish something like this and then be able to give it to someone you love.