Post-Christmas Recap and January Goal

 Hi there :)  Things have been quite here over the holiday, mainly because I was working on Christmas presents which I couldn't show on the blog.  One set of quilt-y presents is in transit currently to its recipients but the other I can show.  This is also my January goal to finish by the end of the month for the Lovely Year of Finishes challenge.

The basted quilt spread out on the floor at my Grandpa's house being admired.

This is another of the quilts made from my uncle's old clothes.  (See the others here and here.)  The others have been made for my cousin, but this one is for my mom.  I've had these old, high-school football jerseys of his for a year, but been mostly just staring at them trying to figure out how to make a pretty quilt centered around football jerseys.  I was also stuck with maroon and grey as two of my primary colors, but eventually inspiration struck.

 I decided to use a palette of maroon, grey, brown, cream, and blue and to make some stars to mix with the jerseys. Fortunately, this is quite a popular combination at the moment.  I bought a charm pack and some yardage of Double Chocolate as well as a little French General.  I wasn't able to get the quilt done by Christmas, but I got it basted before we traveled to visit out family two states over.

A star with some of my beginner FMQ

I took the basted quilt with us on the trip and one evening, after dinner as everyone was settled in the living room over coffee, I surprised mom with the partially finished quilt wrapped in Christmas paper.  I knew that this would be a very emotional quilt for my mom and I wanted to be able to give it to her surrounded by her family.

Quilt-parazzi taking pictures to put on Facebook

Mom loved the quilt! And so did everyone else, it was exciting for them to see those jerseys again.  I had the classic problem of being worried that the quilt would be too small for a sofa quilt and instead ending up with a queen size bed quilt.  Oh well, Dad's already looking forward to putting this on their bed :)

Beginner feathers

 I've been using a mix of straightline quilting and my beginning free motion skill to slowly quilt the monster. Mom won't mind if the quilting is less than perfect, I'm sure she's just ready for me to give it to her for real, so she can put it on her bed and enjoy it.

Honestly, after the first hellish afternoon battling tension issues, FMQ has been not so bad.  I have a long way to go before I'm happy with my technique, but I feel like I'm on the right road. 

Spread on my full size bed. Such a big quilt!

I hope everyone's Christmas and New Year were happy.  I'm looking forward to a quilt-y 2013 ;)

 (edited to add: A Lovely Year of Finishes)