My First Quilt! And Some Extras....

Most of you know I like to sew.  I have an etsy shop and a FaceBook boutique, both of which I've temporarily "closed".  Katie requires so much more care than normal while she's in this cast.  While I do my sewing after everyone has gone to bed, between working full time, taking care of my family when I get home, projects around the house, grocery shopping, etc. and the extra attention Katie needs, by the time everyone has gone to bed I do not have the energy right now to sit down and start working on sewing orders.  Do I think it will be closed forever?  Probably not.  I love, love, love making things for other people.  Do I know when it will reopen?  No, I don't.  I'm sure I will lose customers, but that's OK.  I will get new ones.  I would absolutely love for sewing to be my full time job, but it's not so I will do it when I can.  Does a closed shop mean I'm not sewing?  Um, no.  I'm just doing it for us right now, which I have not done for a long time.

Katie has had the Ikea doll bed for about a year and a half.  It came with a "bedlinen" set, which was horrible.  It was a tiny little flat pillow and a flannel blanket.  Cozy, no?  I want to start quilting, but didn't want to jump right in to a huge quilt since I've never made one before.  I thought a doll quilt would be a perfect place to start.  I used the pearl flower doll quilt pattern from The Cloth Parcel, and I left off the pearl flower.  The pattern was SUPER easy to follow.  It's one page.  Without distractions, this could easily be completed, from cutting through sewing, binding, etc. in two hours.  

I used a mermaid fat quarter bundle I had from Joann (which also has seahorses and a cute octopus fabric), a pink fabric with tiny white polka dots, an aqua fabric with larger white polka dots, a solid turquoise, and a very faint blue and white chevron.  The backing is a light green with tiny turquoise diamonds.  I had all of these fabrics already, so my cost for this project was zero dollars.  My favorite.  

I made the quilt and put it on the bed, and it looked pitiful.  There was no pillow, no mattress, nothing.  Just a quilt on a wooden bed.  So next I sewed up a little pillow.  I didn't take a picture of just the pillow, but it's just a white cotton solid that's roughly 10 inches long by 6 inches wide.  I measured the inside of the bed rails (12 inches) and just eyeballed it from there.  Then I used some of the leftover fabric from the fat quarter pack to make the coordinating pillowcase.  I still didn't love it, so I wanted to make a mattress.

Thank you Pinterest, I found a great tutorial on making the mattress.  I was planning to just get some foam and cut it to size, but I love this so much more.  It was MUCH easier than I thought it would be when I started reading about a hand tufted doll mattress with box pleats.  For real - less than an hour to make it from start to finish.  And I had everything already (fabric, quilt batting, and polyfill stuffing that I took from a pillow that had a tear).  These are about $20-ish on etsy, and I made mine for free with materials I already had and about an hour of my time. 

I'm in love with this little set.  And with quilting.  I can't wait to make another!  We're putting bunk beds in the playhouse, and they will be smaller than a traditional bed.  I'm considering making the mattresses for them with this method, and making some custom sheets and quilts to fit them.  

Please ignore the spiderman pull-up, naked child,
and Spongebob duck tape on her cast!

Little Mama liked the blanket a lot too.  She saw it and immediately pointed to herself and said, "Yea!  KK!," and asked for a baby.  Jack, her happy servant, went upstairs to get her a baby, which she proceeded to snuggle, wrap up, sing to, pat on the back, and feed.  This is HUGE.  This child hates dolls.  Hates them.  She's terrified of them and would spank them and throw them out of the room.  Loving on one and playing with it in an appropriate way is a big step for my little mama, and I was so proud of her.  I keep showing her this picture and telling her what a good mama she was to her baby, and she gets very proud and smiles.  I love my girl.