Ombre Baby Quilts

Every now and then, this crazy and unexpected military lifestyle that we live hands us something oh-so-wonderful. In my case and in this instance, it was in the form of two chance neighbors who became special and life-long friends. On this random little street on this random military base, I was blessed to move in right next door to two gals who supported me a ton these last few years (and whom I’ve been able to support right back during equally tough times.) When I learned they were both expecting precious baby boys just a few weeks apart, I couldn’t wait to make them both something that would connect all three of us together forever, no matter where our military paths take us from here.

As I’ve been doing all year long, I’ve been quilting with my Mother’s fabrics (that I unearthed out of her immense fabric stash after her death). When life gets busy and it feels like I’ve moved on too quickly, cutting and sewing and pressing her fabrics over and over helps me stop and reflect and miss her. When I came across this cool set of ombre fabrics she hand-dyed herself, I knew I wanted to use these imperfectly perfect swatches to make small quilts for my two dear friends!

My original plan was to use all the shades of blues and greys together to make two identical quilts like THESE. But…it wasn’t quite coming together right. So after quite a bit of brainstorming, I had the brilliant idea to add WHITE…and boy, that did the trick!

When I was working with the fabrics up close, the blues felt really different…but in pictures they look pretty similiar. One has more Dutch blue tones with this really neat mini ikat backing!

The other one has what I would call more “stormy” blues – and I backed this one with this adorable mini scallop print!

Each one was quilted in a pretty basic straight-line criss-cross pattern and bound in the same fabric as the backs.

Even though this quit design was somewhat of a happy accident, I’m loving how these two quilts work together, and am already scheming how I could use a similar pattern/technique to make a bigger quilt!

These quilts are far from perfect – the fabric is a tad wrinkly from the dying, and my quilted lines are far from straight. But just like life lately, through all the wrinkles and crooked lines, I still ended up with something pretty darn beautiful!

I hope these quilts are loved and used by these sweet new babes and their mamas. And when we’ve all moved far away from each other, these gals can look at these quilts and I can look at these pictures…and we can all remember what a special thing we had! Love you girls!!!

The whole “just add white” to this quilt gave me an idea! Remember the “quilt I couldn’t finish”?? Well, adding white might just do the trick with that one too, so I’m back on track to get that one finished next! Here’s a peek!

See you back here real soon!