Going Green

The guild to which I have belonged ever since I moved to Kentucky has a "challenge" each year.  In my opinion, it is usually not really much of a challenge; all that happens is that those who chose to complete the "challenge" can show their finished quilts at the Christmas meeting, which is the dead-line.  Those who finish theirs later can show them later, and those who never finish just don't open their mouths.

In last year's "challenge" each quilter "blindly" drew a piece of fabric out of a bag.  The "challenge" was to use all of that fabric in a quilt top, adding as many additional fabric as one wished, and using at least some nine-patches. I picked the pale green print which appears as the background fabric. I cut all of it into 4" squares and went through my box of 4" squares and picked out all the green ones and started making nine-patches. When I had used up all the challenge fabric, I had 25 squares which I put together into the above quilt.

I had not started making it with a particular recipient in mind but at some point remembered that I had never made a baby quilt for our friend John Garland when he and his lovely wife Pamela had their first child, Eli.  That was actually about 2 years ago, but this quilt finished at 54" by 54" so I thought it was big enough for a toddler - and better late than never, right?
Since the top, while nice and green, might not totally appeal to a toddler, I bought some cute saggy-baggy elephant fabric for the back, instead of piecing the back out of whatever I happened to have on hand. Regina quilted it to perfection using a "Square Meander" pattern.

In May, John's parents, Ed & Judy Garland, hosted a benefit for the Southern Center for Human Rights, at their amazing home - Ed is on the Board of the Center - so I got a chance to hand deliver the much delayed quilt to John.