I was recently asked by Connected By A Thread to participate in the A Vision to Remember blog tour. A few months ago, I was part of the AVTR Easy Peasy Rag Quilt blog tour and had such a great time sewing up a quilt for my kids. Click here to read more about that quilt!
This time around, I wanted to make a quilt for a very dear friend of mine. Her and I share so many of the same loves: Doris Day, tea, books, classic movies, the beach, and flip flops just to name a few. To celebrate our 30th birthdays this year, we splurged and spent the weekend at the Doris Day Hotel in Carmel by the Sea, California. Coolest vacation ever.
On to the quilt! When the blog tour call was posted for the Addy Mae Rag Quilt pattern blog tour, I knew this pattern would be spot on for my friend! I simply loved how it has several big squares (approx 9"x9" to showcase larger prints) and had several medium squares to feature other favorite fabrics and colors. From using other patterns from this designer, I knew the instructions would be spot on and easy to follow. This pattern features options for a baby blanket, toddler/child blanket, and an add on to make the baby blanket into a car seat cover. I opted for the larger size blanket, but wanted a little extra length. It was easy to add on the length, I simply found where the blanket repeated and added an extra section (for this quilt, I added an additional two large squares in length).
Another great feature on this pattern is that it includes a line diagram, I printed off two copies of that page and grabbed my daughters markers and set to work with my planning and scheming. That helped a ton with knowing what fabrics I needed to cut to what size.
My friend loves dance, and I knew I needed to incorporate it somewhere in the quilt. While the pattern recommends at least one layer is flannel (it frays better), quilting cotton works well, so I made two squares with quilting cotton. On one I drew two dancers using a pattern from Twin Stitchers. It was meant to be hand embroidered, but I just loved the look of simply using fabric markers.
The rest of the Twin Stitchers dancer pattern included this lovely phrase. Again, I mainly used fabric marker, but I really wanted the word "dance" to pop, so I hand embroidered that word. Isn't it darling! I did have to shrink the wording slightly to fit it nicely on the square.
The perk of rag quilts is they go together very quickly. The front and back are sewn together at the same time, so I honestly spent more time cutting and planning than sewing. I sewed the entire blanket together in one day with several interruptions. I love how the back of the quilt can be a completely different color scheme. It almost feels like having two styles of a quilt in one! For the back, I found a darling friendship quote flannel fabric from www.joann.com. I used that as the basis of my color scheme for the back of the quilt. While shopping on the JoAnn website, I also came across the tea fabric and really wanted to feature the darling tea cups.
After sewing it all together, all the seams need to be clipped. This is the perfect way to spend the kid's nap time on a winter afternoon. I turned on Netflix, snuggled up under the quilt and started snipping. It's relaxing and a good excuse to sit around and catch up on favorite shows.
When making the Easy Peasy Rag Quilt, I mentioned to the designer about how much it made my hands hurt trying to snip it with my sewing scissors. She recommended the Heritage Rag Snips and they are completely worth the investment! I was able to snip this during Saturday evening and start back up Sunday morning on the drive to and from church. By the time I was finished, my hand barely hurt at all! They were wonderful and I am so thankful for the great customer service that was offered by the owner of A Vision to Remember on Facebook!
A Vision to Remember Addy Mae is the perfect gift for all those little babies this winter! Be sure to check out the different blankets this week!
Jan 26- Larissa from Connected by a thread
Jan 27- JaNette from Merri Poppins
Jan 28- Patricia from Sew Far North
Jan 29- Essence from Adventures with Bubba and Bug
Jan 30- Jona from Stitches & Spills
