The start of an obsession that will surely kill me.

F*$!!SONOFA!!!&$$$AAARGHHHHH!!$@#!!

That is the written interpretation of the sound I make when I scream/swear/clench my teeth/summon-my-inner-demon/weep/pull-my-hair-out. As has been the case for the past hour, as I attempt to upload pictures onto this here blog. I am so pissed at blogger, or Charter (my internet provider) or the hacker who infected my computer with some kind of virus or Al Gore or whoever created the world wide web. Because I have no patience (or understanding of) technology and it is SERIOUSLY screwing with me tonight.

But. Because I love you (and might be *somewhat* OCD), I am persevering. You're welcome.

Okay, PROJECTS!!!!

Big J and L's preschool teacher is having a baby! And for the past couple of months, the room moms have been planning a baby shower for her, complete with a "keepsake" from the class. Here's is where I step in and volunteer my services to help make a class quilt.

Only, I have NEVER BEFORE made a quilt. Minor detail.

I have a mother-in-law that is quite a seamstress, and she has made quilts before (though it's not really her thing). I figured her general skill and patience, combined with my raw enthusiasm and tendency to take on enormous projects would get the job done. I was right.

Here is where I tell you that quilting is quite an enjoyable activity. It takes time, but it is not particularly difficult, ESPECIALLY if you are doing a really simple pattern like the one you see here--all squares and rectangles. If you want to recreate the Mona Lisa with a .2 inch square pattern, well, you might be nuts-o and that might be *more* challenging.

Okay. A teacher at G's school does a similar quilt every year, and so I began by picking her brain on how she does the kid's artwork. It's simple...white cotton fabric (I used Kona cotton, she used muslin) and Sharpie markers. Other blogs I referenced had kids draw their pictures on paper, and transferred them on to printable fabric. Yikes, that sounds like it might take 20 years! I cut all of my squares (5.5 x 5.5 inches) and took them up to the school where the kids drew to their hearts content...some of the colors tended to run into the fabric a little, but not so much that I thought it looked bad. We are talking about PRESCHOOL artwork...a little runny-ness fits the theme. So long as the kids don't use the quilt squares as toilet paper or a kleenex, I think you're good.

Once the squares were done, I rinsed them (in my washing machine) to get some of the excess ink out and prevent any bleeding in the future. Here is also where I used Retayne to help set the ink--it is a dye fixative that I bought at a local fabric store (they knew exactly what I needed when I called), but here it is on Amazon for reference. The directions are on the bottle, and I did EXACTLY what it said.

I bought three different fabrics and just went crazy. I tend to think that with the craziness of the kid's drawings, BOLDER IS BETTER! I really do love all the color (and polka dots). The strips in between each child's artwork were cut to 5.5 x 2.5 inches, and the long strips that run horizontally are 2.5 inches wide, cut across the entire width of the fabric (which was 45 inches). I knew the quilt would be eight rows, with five child squares in each row. In between each square was a 5.5 x 2.5 inch piece. So basically, I sewed each row together and then sewed the rows together with a long, 2.5 inch wide strip between each row.

When that was all said and done, I added a border of red and white polka dots (3.5 inches wide) all the way around the quilt. From there I laid a layered the quilt baking, the quilt batting and the quilt top on each other and pinned the crap out of it. Everything that happened after that was a big mess of precision that I had NO BUSINESS being a part of, but my MIL guided me through it and at the end of the day, it all worked out. I won't even begin to tell you how to "quilt" something, but trust me when I say that there are PLENTY of great blogs out there that will walk you through it. Click HERE and HERE for a couple that were recommended to me.

Here is Margaret, Big J and L's teacher, as she walked into her surprise shower. Other than the fact that she looks like she shoved a small basketball under her shirt, there are NO CLUES that she is pregnant. It makes me want to feed her milkshakes.

I couldn't resist. Had. To. Add. A. Matching. Burp-cloth. Had to.

And this is part of Margaret's classes (there are 40 kids total, counting morning and afternoon classes). The kids definitely remembered drawing their squares and were all over finding their artwork. Priceless. And Margaret LOVED IT! Which makes it all worth it. It was the most, perfect-est keepsake for a preschool teacher. Eva.

And now I will tell you how this little story is going to play out, over the next 7 months.

My quilting high will result in me wanting to sew quilts for EVERYONE! Yeah!

It will be fun. For a while.

Until I decide to create 27 quilts in time for the Christmas holiday. And when I am jacked up on caffeine and unshowered for 16 days straight, I will officially lose my love of quilting.

Mark my words.