Happy Birth Day

She finally arrived! Viviana was born Friday, Aug. 3 at 8:41am, weighing 8lbs, 3oz and 20.5 inches long. Just like her older brother, she came 12 days past her due date. That gave me a lot of time to putter around the house cleaning things and squeeze in some last minute sewing projects.

One thing I got to do was attend the Long Beach International Quilt Festival. I won a ticket to attend at the last meeting of the Orange County Modern Quilt Guild and was crossing my fingers that somehow I'd be able to make it. While there I saw Julie of Jay Bird Quilts and bought her new Hex N More ruler and Candy Dish pattern.

 

Candy Dish is a pattern to make 2 pillows, but I instead decided to use a whole charm pack of Kona solids to make a baby quilt. I have to say I like the Hex N More ruler and the accompanying instructions for how to use it. I have other rulers for cutting triangles and hexagons, but I found this to be very efficient - a time saver!

Happy Scraps

 I intended this to be a quick 'early labor' project, but there were so many nights when I started to feel some contractions that I would start to work on it not knowing if it was the 'real thing' or not. I ended up finishing the quilt top days before my labor really started. 

'Happy Birth Day' quilt top

 Yesterday I finished the quilt back using up every last scrap from my top. My plan is to sandwich this and hand quilt it. Since I have the baby with me now so often I have very little time to sit at my sewing machine, so hand quilting will probably get this finished much faster. Thing is I've never hand quilted before - I appreciate any tips!

'Happy Birth Day' quilt back