I also made a couple of cute swaddling blankets using this as a guide.
Finally, I'm sewing the binding on a wall-hanging quilt to welcome home a very sweet baby boy adopted from the Congo. This one was a long-time coming and, like many projects had it share of grumbling (mostly, "what was I thinking" and "oh no, it's not working!!) and payoffs (as in, "this actually looks like a quilt!"). You know how that goes, right? 
My biggest realization from making these last projects is how much I love the soft, reassuring feeling of a hand-made blanket spreading out around me. Or wrapping one around one of my sweet children. This is a heritage passed down from my great-grandmother. As a child, we had almost no "store bought" blankets in our home or on our beds. My great-grandma would hand cut and hand piece quilts all winter long, tie or hand quilt them, and give them to her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Their beauty was not in their preciseness or perfect color coordination, but in their quirkiness, and their slight imperfections. I loved them more and felt more at home wrapped in their soft honesty.
Making this most recent quilt for a friend revealed my many flaws as a quilt-maker. It's far from square and precise and I thought that was a downfall, but it certainly makes the quilt unique. It is no less filled with love, for sure!
More on this idea soon, but in the mean time, here is a lovely flickr group with quilts in the spirit of a quilt artist named Denyse Schmidt who makes me smile and gives me hope I might be able to create art with fabric and bring a smile to someone else.
