Monogramed Wedding Quilt

My friend Mike contacted me last year to see if I could make a custom wedding quilt that he could give to his wife as a wedding gift on their honeymoon. Seriously the sweetest most thoughtful gift ever! Of course I'd help him out! I've known Mike since we were young & it was so fun to be able to do this for him. There was a specific design element that needed to be used, the custom monogram that his soon to be wife had designed for a phone cover. She used this monogram for their wedding invites & planned on using it through the years for stationary & such. Mike sent me a copy of the giant B. The only other request was the color pallet. He wanted the colors of the fabrics to be grey & yellows. Those were the wedding colors.

 I knew I wanted to keep the design fairly simple, chic, modern, & yet it still needed to keep a little bit of a traditional feel to it. I always buy fabrics before I sketch up a custom order. That might sound backwards but I have to know what I'm working with before I can get started on a sketch. Once I knew what fabrics I'd be using I made a fabric sketch of what the quilt would look like. I sent the sketch to Mike & he approved it right away. We were on a pretty strict deadline. I had two weeks from start to finish to make an over sized king quilt.

The middle section seriously took me a little over a week to finish. I had no idea it would be so labor intensive. I made patterns for the giant B & the design around the circle. Once I got all the applique ironed on the sewing it down was what took so long! Once that part was finished sewing all the rest of the quilt together was simple. It was pretty much over sized strips sewn to make a giant log cabin like pattern. Really a box, but you get the picture.

Mike also wanted a custom label for his quilt.

I free motioned the label with my Babylock. 

That touch of modern I mentioned earlier in this post, well I used it for the back. I think it's nice to have a mix of both. I mailed this off to Mike 4 days before his wedding! I think I was more nervous about how last minute it was. When he got the package the next day (I overnighted it) he freaked out! He was so happy with it. I love making something from start to finish. When someone is so happy with the item I have made that makes it all the more rewarding! Thanks Mike for believing in my talent. I wish you & your sweet wife the happiest life together!

Tula Pink Shoreline Quilt

My sweet friend Nicole contacted me last year to see if I could make her a memory quilt using the table runners from her wedding reception. I thought it was such a wonderful idea & was up for the challenge. She sent me her runners & they sat is a bag for a few weeks while I thought about, sketched ideas & then finally found the perfect pattern to use for this project. Most of the time I like to come up with my own pattern when it comes to custom quilts but nothing that I sketched felt right. When I saw Tula Pinks free pattern for her Shoreline Quilt I sent the image to Nicole & she fell in love with it! I've known Nicole since elementary school & it just warmed my heart to be able to do something like this for such a dear friend.

I went shopping for fabric & then got everything cut & ready to put together. The project sat for almost a whole month. There were reasons why but they aren't worth mentioning on my blog. I kept in contact with Nicole & she knew I'd start when I was able.

Once I got started again everything went pretty quickly. She was a total joy to work with. Good thing because she restored my faith in custom orders.

One of the things she asked for was a label for the back of the quilt. I'd never done one before & had so much fun making it.

All of the fabrics were purchased at Joann's & Hancock Fabric.

I loved Tula Pinks pattern. It was very user friendly. The only thing I did differently was I added extra strips to the width & lengthened all the fabric measurements so that it would fit a queen sized bed. Because of the ease of the pattern this was easy to do. You can find the pattern ::here::

The best part about this whole process was sending it off & getting the email in my inbox saying just how much she loved it. Always makes the whole process that much sweeter.