This is a journal quilt that is about 9" x 12". It is made from fabric that I used to make Sophia and Olivia's First Communion dresses and matching purses.
Each month, I plan to do a journal quilt. For my January 2010 journal quilt, I thought about the highlights of the month so far.
What came to mind immediately were these things:
- Both of my daughters made their First Communion on January 10th. I sewed and hand-beaded the girls’ dresses along with my mom’s assistance in helping put in the zippers, gathering the skirts around the waistband, and showing me how to put in sleeves.
- Having lots of snow and winter snowstorms.
- Building a rather large snow fort (with 3 rooms) in the backyard with my daughters (we add to it almost every day).
- Looking at the stars at night with my daughters after we do nightly chores for the miniature horse and pony. The constellation Orion is clearly visible in the eastern sky – and it is another constellation that the girls now can recognize in the sky.
The techniques I used in my journal quilt were patchwork, hand-embroidery and embellishment (hand-sewing beads onto the quilt).
On the plain cotton fabric in the first and last rows of the quilt, I hand-embroidered snowflakes to represent all the snow we’ve received and the snow fort we’ve been building.
In the third row, I hand embroidered 7 stars to represent the constellation Orion (2 for his shoulders/top of his body, 3 for his belt, and 2 at the bottom to represent the bottom of his body).
After that was done, I had each of the girls lay one of their hands onto the quilt. I traced it with a fabric pen (the blue ink that washes out with water).
I then put batting and another piece of white cotton fabric behind that; and pinned it together. With a sewing machine, I sewed around the outline of the hands.
