Baby Charm Quilt...

Decided to make a little quilt for my new baby nephew. Found a few charm packs and took about an hour to figure out what combinations of fabrics to use. Decided to do a rainbow of 6 color rows, using as many of the same designs but you know of course there was design A in 5 of the colors and design B in only 4, etc. So it took a bit to figure it out but eventually i just made it work...

Laying out the strips...

First 4 rows assembled. Pretty fast - about 7-8 minutes a row...
I think I had the top pieced in less than an hour.

My mantra was "bang it out. bang it out." : )
I think I was trying to prove something to myself.

Basting the batting to the top.
Yeah, I don't really know what I'm doing, honestly.

The ugly underbelly. Lots of trimming.
Everything was crooked. oy.

The quilt turned right-side out... I think I'll restitch it on the inside and then I'll top stitch it... Was kind of wanting to hand-quilt it - it felt so good in the hand - but about 8 " from being done I broke the needle and had to completely disembowel about 4 bags and my whole desk trying to find my flipping machine needles... so - stopping here for tonight and we'll see what's what in the light of day.

11/30/12 update: Meanwhile, back at the ranch... So now I've restitched the outer border
on the inside, trimmed it, de-safety-pinned it, and have sewn closed the opening.
I've finished top stitching the edge, finished the stitch in the ditch quilting
and am moving on to embellishing some of the light squares with some free motion stuff.

A litle free-motion... very new to me! As someone who doodles spirals habitually (and smoothly)
you would think this would be more comfortable but it's kind of like trying to draw
a portrait with my left hand - very awkward... but I am staring to see
how it does indeed get easier with practice.

The backing against the top. I think I should be able to finishe it tonight.
I am starting to feel like a bonafide quilter. P.S. I was watching episodes of Hoarders while working on this...
I was feeling like I needed to brush up... "the room" is like - whoa. You know what I'm talking about. This sure
didn't have the acreage to bust much stash. About a yard and 1.5 charm packs total... but it did inspire me to revisit all my pending projects - the topic of my next post. oooo.