Group-made baby quilt

Dear Shayne,

I belong to a little crafty group at work that meets every Tuesday for lunch to hang out and... well, craft. Most of us knit, but we've also got a cross-stitcher and a hooker (that is, crochet) (yup, we're 12). Over the years, we've had various other crafts show up -- as long as it doesn't involve power tools (too noisy), everyone is welcome to join us and craft.

Almost everyone in the group also sews, so when one member of the group got pregnant (Hi, Hollie!) we decided to make her a baby quilt.

It was super fun! Like an old-fashioned sewing bee. I love to craft and group crafting is even better. FUN.

Most of the crew hadn't made a quilt before, so we started the day with lessons. We picked blocks from the awesome-est quilt block book ever, Marsha McCloskey's Block Party (sadly, out of print) and then we went to town.

Our most prolific seamstress (Hi, Jocelyn!) made three blocks and our little hungover bunny (I won't call you out on the blog, bunny -- you know who you are) even managed to make one. Everyone else made 2 and it all worked out perfectly!

(If you click through to view that image on Flickr, you can hover over each block to see who made it.)

Came out beautifully, didn't it?

Our cross-stitcher made a beautiful letter M (the baby's last name begins with M) from my Cross Stitch Letters Bible. It came out so beautifully that I thought maybe we should just frame it, but I went ahead and put it into the block you see in the middle:


Other than that one, I made this block -- called, appropriately, the "Friendship block":


Once it was finished, I wrestled with how to "sign" the quilt. I tried embroidery, but my embroidery mojo just was not with me last week. Ugh. So I used a permanent fabric marker and I wrote all of our initials on the back, in the leaves of the fabric:

(I love that backing fabric. I bought more of it so I can make my own quilt and use it on the back. Loves. It.)

We gave the quilt to the expectant mom yesterday -- she's due within the next few days, so we got it done just in the nick of time! Go, Team Crafty!

love,
kelly