I have not done any quilting in a long, long time. But as I was thinking of a gift for Luka’s teacher, I thought, well a quilt could be nice. After a few sketches and several versions, I decided to do a pillow, with all the kids’ names in the middle of each block. I was debating whether to print the names using letter stamps and fabric ink. Didn’t like the look, and the letters were too big. Then I contemplated printing using inkjet printer on fabric (I have some I bought at JoAnn’s), but there were two problems, again. I did not like it, and I had only off-white fabric and I really needed white. Then I remembered I had some permanent fabric markers, tried on a piece of fabric, put it through a wash and dryer cycle and – it worked. I liked the look, and I could make letters as big or small as I wanted. I just needed a steady hand.

As I have not done this in a long time, I got a bit overwhelmed trying to pick fabric for the quilt. I almost quit the whole idea, when I decided to just pick two fabrics that coordinated and had enough color in them to make it interesting. Here are the strips (except for the white fabric which I thought too boring to show in this pic):

Today I managed to find some time to finish the top. I pieced it on Friday, but wrote the names yesterday. I felt very cofident I guess – what if I messed up a name and had to replace a piece? Would not like that. But I was lucky, and here is what it looks like now:

How happy am I with it? Well… I find it a bit busy. Actually, that’s why it took so long to add the names. I had it on my desk and I looked at it every time I passed by. Sort of getting used to it… But it looks better now with the names and the quilting. It will probably look even better when I add the back and the binding. Luka likes it and since it is for his teacher, that’s all that matters.