Dresden Baby Quilt

I guess I didn't get all the dresden plates out of my system with my last finished quilt. I really wanted to make some traditional dresdens with the pointy blades, instead of rounded off like my modern dresdens quilt. This one is for a very good friend who just had her first baby. We grew up together, and even though we don't talk all that often now, she is just one of those people I will always think of as a close important friend. And when we do get to see each other, it's a very happy thing.  

I started by pulling soft girly colors out of my bag o' scraps. The picks edited themselves into a pastel primaries selection. Then I added the black sketch print and a couple other black or gray prints. That was all it needed to tie everything together with an edge. But a baby-appropriate edge. So it's pretty fun that I was able to get such a great color story just from my scraps. I only had to cut into a couple of my new pink Lizzy House Pearl Bracelets.

The quilting was pretty experimental. I had borrowed my mom's copy of Angela Walter's FMQ book and one night I was drinking wine and looking thru pictures in it. Then I decided, "hey I should just do some of that to my dresdens." So that's the extent of the planning that went into it. I tried swirly things in the center circles. I wish I had taken a close up of that light blue one, because it was the first and it really sucks. But the other three are pretty good.

This is an example of pretty good. Really, I should show more of the sucky stuff right? Then I just did meandering loops in the rest of the dresdens. Straight lines finished out the background, mostly because I knew I would screw things up if I tried another fmq pattern there. Still, it always feels good just to get slightly more comfortable with it. And the combination of quilting styles gave it a great crinkle.

I bound it in Bella Feather, same as the background, to keep the impact of the plates. My first choice would have been that black sketch, but I didn't have enough. I like the look of white binding a lot though.

The back is a Liberty Lifestyle print from Bloomsbury Gardens. The quilt finished at about 43" square.

Now I'm working my way through the WIP list and I hope to have more finishes to show for it soon!