Hannah's Birthday Quilt

A special occasion came to pass while I was on my little blogging break. Hannah turned 17!

Now, Hannah and I have had a running joke going for quite some time now. She didn't have a quilt. Sure, I've started a few for her over the years, but none ever had the privilege of seeing completion. The joke grew over time, and reached a little frenzy once Emma got here. Emma has four quilts. Hannah found this rather unacceptable. :-) Tension mounted and demands grew! Hannah insisted that her time had come!

Well, I agreed. The problem is that she is P-I-C-K-Y when it comes to fabric and patterns. We looked in several quilt shops together and even at the quilt show, but she never could settle on exactly what she wanted for her quilt. This made me rather nervous, because the entire time I was working on this quilt for her in secret. I would wait for her to leave the house, then haul out my little hidden tote and sew like mad. I was so worried about whether she would like it, but this line of fabrics just reminded me so much of her.

I used Moda's Cherish Nature line. It has bird eggs and butterflies and little bees all over it. Perfect for my nature loving girl. I chose a simple and graphic design to really showcase the fabrics.

As her birthday approached I began to fear I wouldn't meet my deadline. Since she had never officially picked out a pattern or fabric, she started to joke all the more about how YET ANOTHER YEAR was going to come and go without her own quilt. After all the teasing and jest, I couldn't imagine anything worse than not having this finished in time for her birthday!

The back gave me fits on this one. I wanted a pieced insert, but made a tragic cutting error at the eleventh hour and had to reconfigure my lay out. It was a doozie, but I'm pleased overall with the outcome.
The label is what threw the wrench in my timing. I decided to draw a butterfly, like the ones on the backing fabric, and then embroider the design by hand. This took way longer than I anticipated, but I was so determined to include it that I had to press on with it. I knew she would love this touch. This is where her Bible verse will go, but I wanted her to choose her own verse for this quilt, so I did not write on it before I gave it to her.

Well, by the time I finally got the label done and the back pieced together, it looked like I was doomed. I was out of time, and Hannah had plans to be home all weekend so I couldn't sew. Then, at the last minute, she got invited to a friend's house, and it gave me the opportunity to stay up through the night and finish! (Buzzard stayed up with me for moral support. How lucky am I? It was a team effort!)

She loved it! (And I'm so relieved.) So here she is, seventeen years later, and FINALLY the owner of her very own quilt. I still want to make her one out of fabrics and a pattern of her choosing, but I'm glad my little surprise was a success.

I love this girl. My nature girl. My seventeen year old, quilt-loving nature girl. See Hannah?? I even got around to proving it to you. :-)