Hugo's quilt

My nephew Hugo turned 5 in May this year, and months prior to that I'd promised him that we would come to his birthday party. I'm not too sure who was more excited - him or me. Plane tickets were booked and I decided to make him his own special "big boy" quilt. I found the perfect fabric when I was at Sew It Together in Sydney in March - a Michael Miller panel featuring retro methods of transport. Given Hugo loves trains so much, I knew I was onto a good thing.

Unfortunately I got really sick for a few months and the quiltmaking got a bit rushed as I was worried I wouldn't finish it in time for his birthday. I pieced the whole quilt in a couple of afternoons. The "blocks" in the panel weren't even so I decided to sew a log cabin frame around each block, and then trim them to the same size. I used black and red polka dot fabrics for the frames. For the little blocks, I joined them together into one big block using black homespun.

 Once the borders were on, I pin basted it on the living room floor. I remember thinking how insane I was doing this - I had labrynthitis from the painkillers I was on, and my stomach hurt like nothing else on earth. A couple of days later this happened. 

I had major surgery a week later - a couple of days before Hugo's birthday - and there was no way I was going to make the party as I was still in hospital. Probably just as well - the quilt hadn't been quilted yet.

A few months later my stomach muscles were strong enough for me to wrestle with a quilt through a sewing machine so I finished the quilting and bound it. 

The day before we left for Queensland for Christmas I attached a label to Hugo's Quilt. I always use a board backed with sandpaper to make it easier to write on the fabric. I drafted the label first with erasable fabric pencil before going over it with a fabric pen and setting it with an iron.

Then I appliqued the label to the back of the quilt.







I found the backing fabrics at my local quilt shop. I knew they'd look great, but I didn't realise (not being much of a selvage reader) that the fabric was actually in the same range as the panel.



I gave the quilt to Hugo on Christmas Day after he'd received all his Christmas presents, and he loved it. I'm glad I didn't go for anything too baby-like for his quilt as he's getting a bit old for that now. Even though he'll still always be my little boy!

The kids have been using the quilt in their new teepee (I have photographic evidence!) I love seeing quilts being used - sat on, stepped on, slept under. That's why I make them.