Where has the time gone? Shoebox Time again!

Doesn’t seem long since I was gathering together items for the Christmas 2018 Shoebox Appeal.

Now I’m putting the finishing touches to a box for a little girl aged 2-4 years.

I always make some homemade gifts and this year I’ve made my usual little patchwork tote and a cover for a dolly. We have a TV programme for little children called In the Night Garden and the dolly is one of the characters from that programme. Our granddaughter loved it when she was small so I have happy memories of it too.

Other years I’ve made a little quilt but this year I’ve made a hand quilted cover, without the batting. It will fold up better in the Shoebox and take up less room.

The cover measures 13” square.

Here’s the patchwork bag, nice and bright:

Front and back are different.

It’s a baby GIRL!

Lovely news, our niece has had a baby Girl, born last Sunday night. Great news, all well, 8lbs 1oz which is a good weight.
Mum and Dad spent the week getting to know her before deciding on the name. She is going to be called Margaret Alice but will be known as Maggie.
The name is a very special choice. My sister in law Margaret died 14 years ago and baby Maggie would have been her first grandchild. Nice for the name to carry on to the next generation and lovely that the baby will have her own version of her Grandma’s name.
Margaret is a family name, Maggie being the third generation.
It was also my Mother in Law’s middle name and coincidentally is my middle name too.

So my recently finished Seeing Stars will be gifted to Maggie, as soon as I have finished embroidering the quilt label. Also in the parcel will be a pink cardigan and little white basket weave knitted blanket also made by Great Aunty Linda!

RSC19 Seeing Stars finish

Finished binding this 37” RSC baby quilt. 

I machine quilted either side of the block joins and hand echo quilted with Perle threads.

Loved the backing fabric when I bought it a couple of years ago and happy with how it looks on the back of my quilt.

A close up of a few of the Seeing Stars blocks

Oops! I changed the title

In September 2017 I made a pink and girly baby quilt from Happy Blocks as my best friend’s daughter was expecting her first  baby. Baby’s parents chose not to know before the birth whether baby was a boy or girl so this quilt was made in case they had a daughter.  However, they had a son and I gifted the “Boy” quilt I had made to cover that eventuality.

Fast forward to now and they had a second baby on Thursday night. This time they chose to know that their expected baby was a girl so of course I knew which quilt I was gifting. I always name my quilts as I finish them but had forgotten what I had chosen for this one so I Called it Happy Squares and embroidered the label accordingly for Grace Rebecca Rose.  Isn’t that a beautiful name?
This morning as I was wrapping the quilt I checked back through my blog to discover what name I had chosen two years ago. It was Happy In Pink which I prefer to Happy Squares.
However the label was made  and sewn onto the quilt so Happy Squares it is.

So, here’s Happy Squares aka Happy In Pink:
It measures 37” squares, the backing was a pretty fabric I had had in my stash for several years but was perfect for this quilt.
The last photo shows the hand knitted cardigan I’m gifting with the quilt.