Astrid's quilt

So as you know by now, each time a new baby comes into the extended family I've been making them a small quilt. This quilt is for the newest darling to arrive, little Astrid, my niece's first baby. We met Astrid for the first time yesterday. She's beautiful, with the cutest blonde quiff and tiny, tiny little hands.

Also traditional is that it has some pieces of flowerpress fabric designs sewn into it, and this one has nine of my patterns in its squares. Can you pick them? (see below) 

I'm really a beginner quilter, this is only my fifth quilt, and all of those were small and simple square patched quilts. But each time I make another my skills and knowledge grow a little more. Here are some of my past efforts, Poppy's quilt, Sid's quilt, Penny's quilt.

This time I got ambitious and changed direction after cutting out all squares. I decided to cut them in half and combine them in two piece blocks, alternating directions between the print and solid blocks. It meant I got to include more patterns and a second solid - a mushroom grey.

It also meant I had to retrim all the pieced squares which had become rectangles, but that went pretty quickly and probably helped keep everything straight. Next time I will decide my design before I start cutting!

For the back of the quilt I found the lightest fawn coloured and patterned flannel at Spotlight, I love flannel backed quilts for softness. I bound it with this fresh lime green spot. Its quite a unique colour combination but I think it works, its a spring quilt and it looks like one!

Quilting is done with simple horizontal lines which match in with the design.

I've said this before, but its worth saying, a simple baby quilt takes a little time but is a simple sewing project, and one that is very forgiving. If you want to have a go at making one yourself my baby quilt tutorial is over here. It shows every step needed to make a simple quilt.

I also have a binding tutorial in the works, because I found I am often dreading this step in the process, and have to look through the directions again. I took some photos this time to remind myself.

If anyone wants some of the Flowerpress fabrics in the quilt, a few of them are available in my Etsy shop. A few are digital and others screenprinted but they all play well together. I'm planning on making up some mixed packs so people can use a mix of my designs like I have here.

The dark blue stars are mine, the coloured spots, the blue blockprinted leaves, the white on linen filigree, the clouds, both blue screenprinted flowers, the blue doily on linen and the green leaf pattern on blue fabric.