A quilt for Ryker

A friend approached me to commission a quilt for her friend, who I haven't met.  She is pregnant with their second child, a boy they have already named Ryker.   However, they were recently given the devastating news that the fetus has a condition making it incompatible with life.  Instead of terminating the pregnancy, the couple has decided to carry the baby to term, hoping to maybe have a few hours to hold their son before he passes.

They call Ryker their little sunshine, so I decided to base the quilt top on sun and sunbeams.  The top is one big paper pieced block.  I had never paper pieced before, but I did a few practice blocks, then sketched this out on freezer paper, roughly using this free tutorial on Craftsy as a guide.  I gotta say, I see more paper piecing in my future!

The top piecing is really quilte simple, and my plan was to do some fancy free motion quilting along the beams to make it meaningful.  I used a nylon "invisible thread" for the first time, this one by Connecting Threads, and was really pleased with the result.  It blended well with all the bold colors here, letting the texture steal the show.

In the sunshine, I tried my hand at some curve-on-curve quilting.

In the orange, I did some "ribbon candy."

In the lighter blue beams, I quilted radiating waves, and put words in them.  I stitched in "Ryker", "you are my sunshine,"  "love lasts forever," and a simple heart.  The alternate navy beams are each a different pattern: a quilted plaid, a stipple, pebbles,  radiating circles and clamshells.  The result is a quilt filled with lots of lovely texture.

I used a DS plaid for the back and Joel Dewberry herringbone in navy for the binding, which was machine stitched in place (getting better at that).

I am hoping this quilt provides some comfort to Ryker's parents; something to hold when he is gone.

Linking up to Fabric Tuesday at Quilt Story.

fly, butterfly: a memorial quilt

My husband grew up in a small town; the kind where one group of 25 kids go through K-12 together, so they get to know each other pretty well. One of his classmates was Rebecca. I have met her a handful of times, and by some luck of fate she found me online via this blog and we chat from time to time. She is one with a golden heart- when I started to knit last year, she sent me a surprise package of knitting gift tags in support.

Last week I read the terrible news that Rebecca had suffered an unexpected stillbirth of her second child, a daughter. As a parent, or just as a human being, I am sure none of us can imagine anything worse than losing a child.

She has been on my mind and in my heart, and I wanted to provide some comfort. In the obituary for Olivia, they mentioned that donations were being accepted for a bench in a local butterfly park in her memory. "Fly, fly our little butterfly," the notice read. From these words, inspiration for a butterfly quilt was born. Something the family could keep in memory of the baby that they could not.

Simple. Grey for the grey skies that they are facing. A smattering of cheery pink butterflies making their way across the sky...and one wee butterfly veering off on her own path. Framed in a binding with cheerful flowers, to symbolize hope, a silver lining. Pink loopy quilting, like butterflies in flight. A few words incorporated into the loopy quilting...."Olivia," "fly" and "love."


More fluttering butterflies abound of the back, a great print by Valori Wells which was literally in my very first fabric order a couple years back....been hoarding it for awhile waiting for the perfect project.



The back also has a label and a quote, which I thought both lovely and appropriate to the situation:

The butterfly counts not months by moments, and has time enough.
-Rabindranath Tagore

I hope that the quilt can provide a small bit of comfort for Rebecca and her family during this heartbreaking journey.

Quilt stats:

Finished size: 26" by 31"

Design: inspired by this quilt. Butterflies from this template, raw edge appliquéd.

Fabrics: backing is Valori Wells Monarch, front scraps of Nicey Jane, Hunky Dory, DS quilts, Children at Play. Grey solid from local quilt shop.

Binding: Children at Play Meadow

Quilting: loopy stipple in pink cotton thread (note- tried this with my feed dogs up this time as I have seen others try, it worked great!)

Label: I used this product (first time, and I was quite pleased with it!)