Happy Mothers' Day!

Today we celebrate the wonderful blessings of motherhood. I have truly loved being a mother and all that it teaches me...the wonderful compliments of how adorable my son is (which I never get tired of hearing, by the way!)...and all the responsibilities it lays at my feet to teach my children. Of all the things I did/didn't expect about being a mother, I didn't realize just how busy I'd be as a stay-at-home mother. (I know, I know! How naive!!)

Well, I love to have a project to work on, and Mark really likes that I enjoy doing little projects. The down-side is that often when I have a project, I rarely get other things done around the house. So, I've been trying really hard to spend my daytime hour(s) when I don't need to be watching Canon really closely doing housework. That only leaves me a few hours at night, after Canon goes to bed but before we go to sleep, to work on my project. Hence the lack of time spent blogging. However, I am nearly done with my project, so I thought I'd show how it's coming.

My sister-in-law Tiffany just had a baby on Tuesday May 3. Lily Paige Dahl was born at 7:53am weighing 6 lbs. 14 oz. and was 19 inches long. I decided to make a quilt for her since I'd never done one for a family member before, and I can use the practice. I was hoping to have it done by Easter to send in an Easter package. Then I was hoping to have it done by the time the baby was born. Then I was hoping to send it by the time they got home from the hospital. Obviously that didn't happen because it's still not completed, but I'm close. Here's my progress:

(Tiffany, if you want to be surprised by the look of the quilt, this is where you STOP READING!! Happy baby!)

Remember this fabric from the puppy quilt I just did for a baby shower?

A pink version of the same stuff...

and an even lighter pink version...

and these adorable lady bugs....

Put them all together, and you have some potential for a baby girl's quilt.

Block type 1

Block type 2

Alternate them, and you can see the pattern coming to life.

a closer look at pattern

I've finished the quilting! Now I need to trim the edges and  add the edging.

 This is the first time that I've ever actually quilted.  All of my other quilts I just tied with yarn.  This blanket I stitched straight lines through all the checkered squares and decided to quilt little pictures of ladybugs on the ladybug fabric. This took me a long time, but I think they turned out really cute.

Ladybug Type 1

Ladybug Type 2

Ladybug Type 3

Ladybug Type 4

Here's to hoping that I can get it done within the week and get it to her before the baby outgrows the other stuff I want to send with the blanket!  :-)