Oh, Baby!

My husband's best friend got married just over a year ago, and on our drive home from the wedding we made a wager on when they'd be announcing that they were expecting. He guessed within two years. I said nine months. I was right.

 The baby shower was a couple weekends ago, and I whipped up some adorable gifts!

 I've broken these projects down into several different posts for ease of reading... scroll down to the bottom here for direct links to each item.

 I started with a quilt (of course), and I decided to try a weekly mystery quilt along from Cora's Quilts- Moonlit Paths by Shelley Cavanna. I chose to do the free version, for which I picked the fabrics to the specifications provided. They also offer kits for this in their beautiful fabrics, but I'm pretty particular when it comes to my quilting. Unfortunately, the last clue to assemble the quilt came out the Friday AFTER the shower, so it obviously wasn't done in time.

 I did, however, choose the perfect colors for this quilt! This will be another surprise gender for the new parents, so I went with my gut and chose mostly neutrals. Mom-to-be absolutely loves purple, which I think is a nice gender-neutral color, and I picked a nice, soft minty aqua as an accent.

 Here is a progress mash-up from the nine weeks or so from March to June...

One thing that I've noticed about Shelley Cavanna's patterns is that she LOVES little tiny pieces. That's the consensus in the Facebook group too. She uses a lot of "stitch and flip" techniques that take a bit of practice to get the hang of, but her quilts are so beautiful that it's totally worth it! Looking through her pattern collection, I'm guessing the finished quilt will go together something like this:
But who really knows for sure!

It's going to be so pretty! I can't wait until it's done!

 When we received our invite to the shower,  I did a little dance in my head- because LOOK AT THE COLORS!
BABY-Q? Hmm... glad I'm vegetarian. Lol!

The theme for the baby's nursery is woodland animals (go figure) in mint green and grey. Bingo! Moonlit paths through the woods... mint green, purple... it's perfect.

 BUUUUT... since the quilt won't be done in time, I dragged Neil to JoAnn's to help me pick out some fabric for a couple cute items "off the registry". The couple is registered for a whole bunch of cute stuff, but I chose these burp cloths, swaddle pockets and bibs from Target to recreate.
Cute, but so generic.

 I have to admit, I was kind of impressed by Neil's interest in this project. I have NEVER seen him interact with a baby (like, EVER), and he actually seemed genuinely excited about this. He was even "trying out" pieces of fabric over his shoulder as burp cloths... weird. And he had a really good idea; instead of buying terry cloth from JoAnn, he suggested getting hand towels instead so they looked more finished with less effort. Smart man! 

 We ended up purchasing seven different fabrics; five cute woodsy minty flannels and and two cotton prints, as well as six coordinating hand towels (from Target).



Here are my finished products! 
 

 

 Check out the following posts for detailed process pictures for each item:




And don't forget to check back in a few weeks for finished pictures of the quilt!

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