Baby Quilt Friday!: Inch by Inch

Welcome back to Baby Quilt Friday, where I'm featuring one quilt a week from The Little Box of Baby Quilts. Today comes Jack's favorite out of all 20 quilts, "Inch by Inch."

From The Little Box of Baby Quilts, copyright 2007 Jenny Wilding Cardon/
That Patchwork Place. Machine quilted by Cheryl Brown.

I started the quilt with this easy-enough sketch:

I thought it looked cute on paper. I started sewing. I sewed all four rows of the Streak of Lightning blocks (a well-known, public-domain quilt block) and cut the background rectangles for the caterpillars. Threw everything down row by row on the floor to have a look.

Then, as I recall, I burst into tears.

The quilt was a mess. Busier than Bejing is today. Too, too, too many colors. Waaay too much stuff going on. And the caterpillars weren't even in the picture yet! After I wiped my tears and took a one-week break from the design, I returned to it for a fresh view. Ah, yes. Too many colors. So, let's take some out. I made another 15 Streak of Lightning blocks, all with blue backgrounds. That seemed to bring it all together.

Still have the original 15 blocks. I have no idea where the other 10 are right now. But that's okay--I would have no idea what to do with them if I knew where they were, anyway. Ideas welcome.

Luckily, the caterpillars came together just fine. When the quilt top was completed and I once again threw it on the floor for a final look, Jack--then just 18 months old--crawled over and plopped himself down on the quilt top. He rubbed his head on one of the caterpillar bodies. Then he lifted his head, puckered up, and kissed that caterpillar's face.

Triumph. (From a baby's point of view, at least.)

After having so much fun working with fuzzy fabrics for the Ten Little Piggies quilt, I decided to try again with the Inch by Inch quilt. I really like the end result. Appliqueing with fuzzy fabric is incredibly easy--the fluff hides your stitches. I could've appliqued the circles blindfolded and it would have turned out okay. Well, maybe not blindfolded. I'm not THAT good at it. But yeah, really easy.

One quick tip for using those fuzzy fabrics, though. When you are cutting, make sure you have a plastic-bag lined garbage can nearby. As you cut, shake the pieces over the can to get rid of any loose fuzzies. When you are finished cutting, your rotary mat will be a mess, too. I turned mine face down, rubbed it on the carpet in my office, and then vacuumed the carpet. I found that to be an easy way to clean up a potentially huge (although a very cute and cuddly) mess.

You can view more quilts from the "little box" here, watch a video about it here, and read more about the quilts here.

Next week comes the quickest quilt in the bunch to make. It's a raw-edge, sashed quilt called "Silly Stripes and Doodle Dots." Yep, you guessed it--starring striped and dotted fabrics. In lovely lime greens, bright blues, and happy purples, no less. Hope to meet you back here next week!