Race Car Themed Quilt for "Big Boy Bed"

atgadmin — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 08:58:00 GMT

Every child's first birthday is exciting and every mother wants to create great memories of the event. This race car themed quilt was created by Gina Martinez to complete her son's graduation to a "Big Boy Bed" and give him a special birthday memory to cherish for years to come.

General Description
Hi, my name is Gena Martinez and I'm a Work at Home mom who makes diapers and slings and has just discovered the joy of quilting! For my son's first birthday, his daddy and I got him a race car bed. I made him a fun, personalized quilt to cover it! I love the way the quilt makes the car bed look complete - almost like the hood of his new race car!

Step-by-step Description
I quilted together squares of Disney's "Cars" printed fabric and some yellow race car fabric. I chose a nice piece of faux Suede for the back/top. I cut a circle out of checkered flag material. I printed a #1 out to trace and I cut the #1 out of the yellow race car material.

I appliqued the #1 (It was his first birthday) onto the checkered flag circle and then the circle on to the Faux Suede. In the bottom left corner I embroidered his name and the year.

I added batting and attached the 2 pieces and tacked around the circle to complete my quilt and the perfect compliment to his new toddler bed!

What Makes This Project Special?
This project was very special to me because it was a neat way to commemorate my baby boy's first year. Hopefully he will always have this #1 quilt as a reminder of his first big day and his first big boy bed!

Skill Level
This is only my second quilt, so I'd say a beginner would be able to tackle this project.

Products
Fabric, thread, sewing machine, embroidery machine, batting

Time Investment
8-ish hours

Why I Love This Project
I love the way it looks and he loves the way the material feels! All of our party guests wanted to know where I had his blanket made!

Send Us Your Creations
Do you have any creations that go with a great story? If so, we'd love to hear about them, and see them! If we choose to post your project, you'll get a free $25 gift certificate to use in the AnnTheGran.com online store. Click here for details on how to submit your creation.

What Would You Do?
Gina personalized her quilt with a name and date. We would love to hear your favorite way to record the when, where and who of quilts and other heirloom gifts that you create. Click on the Comments link to share your stories.

Cool Pirate Costume for Halloween - Thanks Grandma!

atgadmin — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 09:30:00 GMT

This embroidery-laden project was sent in by Barbara Schaffer, and I chose it for this week because it's a wonderful example of how a grandma can still be cool with a 10-year-old boy! Forget the old idea of Grandma knitting a sweater they'll never wear; with all that we have at our disposal now, we can take anything in our minds and create something limited only by our imaginations. I'll let Barbara take it from here!

General Description
This is the pirate costume that I made for my grandson. . . pants, shirt, vest and booty bag with a total of 13 embroideries I didn't have a pattern for it so I designed my own but a purchased pattern should be available at your local fabric store. It is also possible to use the child's own clothing and just apply the embroidery.

Step-by-step description
First I cut out all of the garment pattern pieces. I stabilized and hooped each piece to embroider a mummy and skeleton on the front of the pant legs. I embroidered a ship on the right sleeve and then the transformed pirate ship on the left sleeve. The shirt pocket got a jolly roger, the cuffs and collar got skulls. The vest has a parrot on the front. The center back has a large pirate with my grandson's initial "C". There are more skulls at the waist back. The booty bag has another skull. When the embroidery was complete I assembled the garments.

What makes this project special?
I'm just a beginner and I feel a lot more comfortable with my machine now. This project really allowed me to practice my skills over and over again because there are so many embroideries involved. I gained new self confidence in my abilities. The WOW! factor has been big.

Skill level
I think that this project could be completed by any skill level. The flat pattern pieces were easy to position and hoop. I knew that if I made a mistake I would be able to discard that piece and cut another to replace it before I sewed the garment together (that really took the stress away). I took my time and enjoyed the learning process. The most difficult part was designing the costume from scratch. I measured some of his clothes to get the proportions right, a slim size 10.

[Note from Ann]:
Barbara did a great job with her placement on the pattern pieces. If you are using a pre-sewn garment you can still easily acheive exact placement without stress using the Perfect Placement Kit. And for no hoop lines when sewing on napped fabrics like Barbara's Pirate costume I recommend the Magna Hoop.

Products
My machine is a Pfaff 2140 with the 5 x 7 hoop. I don't have a smaller hoop but a smaller hoop would be useful with the smaller designs if you have one. I used almost every pirate theme design that I could find in my stash. I used cut-away stabilizer and polyester embroidery thread because it is more durable for children's clothing that is washed often.

Time investment
I completed the costume in about a week because I made the clothing as well as the actual 13 embroideries.

Why I love This Project
My grandson was so surprised when I gave him this costume. He can't stop smiling. He says,"Grandma, you are awesome!" that's a real compliment from a 10 year old. I can't stop smiling either!

Send Us Your Creations
Do you have any creations that go with a great story? If so, we'd love to hear about them, and see them! If we choose to post your project, you'll get a free $25 gift certificate to use in the AnnTheGran.com online store. Click here for details on how to submit your creation.

What Would You Do?
Using a variety of themed embroideries from various sources, Barbara created a complete look that gave just the right impact to her project. How do you find all the designs for a theme in your library? Click on the Comments link to give us your ideas.

AnnTheBlogger : boys

Race Car Themed Quilt for "Big Boy Bed"

Cool Pirate Costume for Halloween - Thanks Grandma!