Hello Dear Friend,

The weeks are rolling by so quickly. We are now in the latter part of April and the Arizona sun is heating up. No complaints on my part though, we had a surprisingly cool and rainy spring season that was wonderful! How has your spring weather been?

A few weeks ago, I placed a teaser photo of a very sweet baby quilt at the end of this blog post: It’s Been 13 Years!

I’ve been anxious to share the details and backstory of the quilt but did not want to distract from the Hollyhock Lane Fabric Tour and Patchwork Casserole Trivet pattern release. Thank you for being patient with me.

First off, let me express the excitement and anticipation we’ve been feeling over having a new baby in the family. It’s been six years since the last baby was born. For sure, my sister and I thought we were done having children. Both with three kids in each brood, we were very content and quite busy. However, last year my sister shared that they would be welcoming another baby to the family and my heart completely melted.

Unlike previous years, I no longer have my own baby to carry and keep on a strict nursing schedule. For the first time, in a long time I will be able to soak in all the newborn baby cuddles. The news just filled me with so much happiness.

In preparation for the sweet little baby to arrive, I planned out the Stacked & Squared Quilt Pattern with a baby size option so that I could give my sister a handmade and one-of-a-kind quilt. The plan was set in motion from the beginning. The toughest part for me would be choosing the right 5″ precut charm pack to use.

I asked my sister what colors she wanted to use in the baby’s space. She specifically said white and soft greens, for a more nature inspired look. Well, I loved that!

A quick search on Etsy brought me to the Hush 2 charm pack by Riley Blake Designs. The prints were a bit busier than I had originally envision using in the quilt but there was a wide range of cute designs that drew me in. On the white backgrounds were low-volume details like tiny houses, florals, rain clouds and even little pretzels. Such cuteness! I had to buy it.

I first planned to pair the mixed charm pieces with a solid green fabric as the sashing, but after attempting a few different options the idea fell flat. Then it dawned on me, such an adorable group of white prints need to be paired with an equally adorable green fabric. I tossed those solids to the side and my first lucky match was this light minty green and white floral I had previously purchased from Hobby Lobby. You see, that random one yard of fabric I had no need for at the time, did eventually come in handy.

I’ll have to remind my husband of this one day.

With a few cuts and my Stacked & Squared Quilt Pattern handy, I got to work assembling the baby quilt which came together super quickly. That’s the beauty of the Stacked & Squared Quilt Pattern and why I recommend it for beginner quilters.

Here’s a nice shot of the many low-volume prints that came in the charm pack.

After a nice press the flimsy top was ready for quilting. Since my sweet little baby niece will need a cuddly soft quilt, I decided to veer away from using the traditional quilting cotton as backing and reached for the best swaddling material: double gauze cotton.

Oh, I love the feel of this material. It brings back so many memories of swaddling my own babies.

A bit unsure of how the material would quilt in my machine, I ironed the gauze as flat as possible to get rid of that extra stretch, opted out of the basting spray and pin basted the layers together. Since I’ve had some bunching when quilting straight lines with the machine walking foot on my Juki, I switched it out for the free motion quilting (fmq) foot and was off to the races!

Thankfully, it quilted like a dream. No bunching, or snags. No pleated stitches. No fuss or worry necessary. The quilt layers glided through just fine.

Let me show you the backing. You can see the double gauze is puffy and accentuates the loopy quilting lines beautifully. Almost like the fluffiness of a cloud. I just couldn’t stop photographing the backing. It was one of those moments that I was just so proud of my work, that I almost couldn’t believe that I had made it myself.

Have you ever thought that about a project? Like, how did I do that?

Here are pics of how I squared it up and sewed on the dark green binding. For a quicker finish, the binding was machine sewn.

Well… it’s fair to say this is one of my favorite baby quilts I’ve made to date. I proudly showed the hubs and made him feel the gauze backing, his eyes lit up and he asked if I would make him one in his size. LOL! That’s a win.

Now all that’s left is to wrap the quilt and give it to my sister. I just can’t wait to see my little baby niece and cuddle her up in this quilt.

Have you ever backed a quilt with double gauze? I would love to hear what your experience was like. If you haven’t yet tried double gauze, I highly recommend it. I’ll meet you in the comments.

Have a wonderful Friday evening and weekend!

love, Jasmine