Last 2014 finish

Today finishes up my week of finishes. Next week I'll be able to share all the things I've started since the new year. I have both quilt projects and knitting projects occupying my time. But back to the last finish of 2014 that started almost a year ago. When I was looking at 2013's calendar and writing birthdays and anniversaries on 2014's last January, I noticed that my father-in-law would be turning 60 at the end of December. My sister and I have worked on quilts together for our parents but I hadn't yet worked on one with my sister-in-law, Michelle. I sent her an email about perhaps working on one for her dad and having the kids help in some way. Her kids at the time were 12, 10 and 6 and mine were 11, 7 and 8 months. She was on board with the idea and we started looking for patterns. When I sent her the link to Cluck, Cluck, Sew's Suburbs pattern we decided it was the one. The houses were easy enough for kids to sew and the blank spaces could be replaced with drawings. Michelle added some paper pieced stars to the top  and we had one amazing quilt. 

Each family did 4 rows. Each kid was responsible for picking the fabrics for their rows (I helped Floyd), then Michelle and I each did a row that tried to balance or fit in with what the kids picked. It's a good thing Michelle had I have similar tastes and thus fabric stashes that worked well together. She mailed me her four rows - her row is at the top with the star row attached to it - and I sewed all the rows together. We ended up going with birth order since the rows went back and forth between the families. Except at the top and bottom since she has the oldest grandchild and I have the youngest and my row is last. We were able to discuss it once in person when we visited in June but all other discussions were done via email. Some kids helped, (pictures of my son sewing here), but they all drew something. Above is the quilt top before I mailed it back to her for quilting.

I also pieced the back. 

On our way up to spend Christmas with family (all our parents live in the same city) we stopped at her house so we could pick up the now quilted quilt which I still needed to put the binding on. We tried to get a picture of all the kids with the quilt but Floyd wouldn't really cooperate. At least he's still kind of in the picture.

A day before his birthday, I set myself up at my parent's house with my old machine which I keep at their house and put the binding on while Floyd napped. Great view. I also did a little writing in that room while we were there but that's a different post. 

Father-in-law with his birthday quilt. I think he was very surprised and very happy with it. Floyd was thrilled that he was allowed to walk on it.

And the back.

Close-ups of the drawings by my kids can be seen in this post.

This is one of the blocks I drew. He lives in the middle of nowhere or the centre of the universe if you ask him, and often posts pictures of animal tracks on his blog. The "human" feet are either his or belong to a sasquatch. 

Using our bed while deciding the layout with Floyd's help, of course.

Final layout and a better look at some of the drawings and blocks.