Quilt for my Niece... We finally celebrated Christmas!!

About a week after Thanksgiving my Sister in Law called and asked if I would sew a quilt for my niece if she bought the fabric.  I, of course, said I would love to.  About an hour later I got a call from my Brother in Law... They were at the store and were picking out fabric... The next day, I had their fabric in hand and it was time to design a quilt that would work with what I had to work with!

I am normally NOT a pre-washer, but this fabric needed to be pre-washed.  So, I had a new experience...  I read a few posts on pre-washing and tossed the material into the washing machine in a zipped pillow case with Color Catchers.  This is what I had after that washing!

After washing the fabrics in Pillow cases with color catchers!

After untangling and pressing those fabrics!
They look so much better this way!

I had three colors to work with, so I went with a simple diagonal step pattern.  I did some quick calculations and grabbed some markers, some graph paper and started to sketch. 

After sketching the pattern, I identified how many of each piece size and
color I would need.  10 8"x4" and 20 4"x4" pieces.

Once the pieces were cut, the pattern made sewing them together a breeze.  This is a very quick and simple quilt to put together.  Just what I needed for a short order Christmas gift!

With only three colors and two shapes, assembly was a breeze.
Yellow to Pink, Pink to Blue, Blue to Yellow and start again.

String piecing at it's finest.  The top half of every block,
done in one long string!  Gotta like that!

After pressing the first pieces open, it was just a matter
of matching the next top in line to the next bottom in line.
Again, Easy Peasy.

This is how I keep pieces organized when I am working on several projects
at once.  Each project, or each portion of a project gets its own clear bin.
I like the clear because I can see what's inside.  (Mikaila's Quilt on the left,
Step one of the GIMQ in the middle and Step two of GIMQ on the right.)

The next day I retrieved the blocks from their box and pressed them open.
NOTE the iron... Do you "Set Your Seams" before pressing open?
I was taught to do this and you will always get a MUCH
cleaner seam when you do!

Once pressed open, they all get layed out
on the floor to insure I got 'em all right.
Looks like I did!

This is how I organize my assembly.  Those little pieces of paper are
marked A1 to A7 (Left Row), B1 to B7 (Center Row) and C1 to C7 (Right Row).
I carefully pick them up in reverse order, C7 to A1.

Then I sew that label right into the seam
and then I can fully assemble the quilt
without ever laying it all out again.

Assembling the quilt, and you can see the tags, helping me stay organized.
After the entire flimsy is complete, I remove them.

So, another reason I am so far behind on the Mystery Quilt this year, but it was so worth it.  I had to wait until now because we couldn't celebrate Christmas until January 3 because of sickness.  So here it is... And here she is...

All smiles... LOVE to see this!

And this.  Cuddling with her Mom while
snuggled in her quilt!

She has Thanked me for it several times already.

I'm Glad you like it Mikaila!

Now to get to work on posts about what I have been doing with GIMQ...

Until His work in me is complete,
Paul