Mountains, baby!

Well, that was an exciting week, wasn't it?  We had a big spring snow storm and virtually no work got done by anyone all week, except by the snow plow drivers and the guys with chain saws who spent quite a bit of time cutting up the massive tree that fell down across my neighbor's driveway.  We lost a few branches, but nothing that required a chain saw, thank goodness.

We all know that a snow day is a free day, right?  So instead of working on real things that I need to get done for my real life, I used the whole day to finish a baby quilt for my friend's first grandson. His parents chose mountains, along with navy, gray, and aqua for him, which was quite the challenge.  I'm afraid there is no aqua in this quilt, but I think I got the style and tone right. Here's how it finally worked out:

How better to photograph a mountains quilt than against the snow? Of course the day after the storm it was bright and perfect outside when I wanted to take pictures, so I had to wait until later in the evening to get photos that weren't totally bleached out.All that snow was pretty blinding!

Except for the center panel with the mountains, this is nothing like I started with. It was lovely to have time to work on it and try things, rip them out, and try something else until I felt like I got it right.  I ended up deciding that piecing of any kind would distract from the mountains, so I just used graduated strips of color, with grays on the bottom and blues on top.

This quilt turned out to be just about 40 by 48, almost exactly where I wanted it to be.  I think that will be a nice size for a tiny boy and still be good when he's a little bigger.  I quilted it with organic lines that were not straight but not curved, either.  These are easy enough in theory, but it's hard to get them to look consistently graceful.  It was a nice couple of hours while I listened to the plows and the wind.

For the backing I used a pretty blue called Prism by P and B Textiles.  It made a nice complement to the colors on the front.  The binding is Kona Celestial.  I was going to use navy but it looked pretty harsh.  This one is just a little bit softer which made it perfect for this project.  And because I like things all blendy, I used a perfectly matching blue thread in the bobbin and 8 different colors of thread in the top. To match the different colors, you know?

When you give a baby quilt, do you wash it first?  I washed this one, then I ironed it so that it will look "new" when little Otto's parents take it out of the box.  Is that weird? Whether it is or not, this little quilt is on its way to its new owner, who is still pretty new himself.  I'm so happy to have this done, and so happy for my friend, because being a grandma is pretty much the best thing ever.  I know this little guy will bring them all so much happiness.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.  Our snow is pretty well melted (since it was 50 degrees today) and I have some fun plans for the weekend.  It's my daughter's birthday, so we'll get to see her, and I'm hopeful that there will be some celebrating.  I can't have cake any more (gluten, bah!) but you know what *is* gluten free?  Most wine.  True fact!  I'll test some for you just to be sure!

Sharing at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Finished or Not Friday, and crazymomquilts.