Three Quilts for Three Musketeers

The assignment was simple - Make a quilt from old baby clothes.
The tricky part - Not one, not two, but three quilts.

Getting the fabric ready for a t-shirt (or onesie) quilt is a slow, labored process.
The painful (for me) part of the whole process is cutting up perfectly nice and cute baby clothes.  It generates a lot of trash - seams, buttons, zippers and oddly shaped fabric slivers.

Aligning fabric pieces on SF101

The tedious part - interfacing each piece of salvaged fabric.  This is slow, because I cannot hurriedly iron over it. Holding the iron down in each section for 8-10 seconds is a must to ensure that the interfacing adheres to the fabric properly. This is followed by squaring each of the above interfaced pieces. And only then can I start to piece.

Design Wall for Layout

SF101 is a must. Design wall is a savior. And most importantly patience is a virtue.

But let's get to the fun part. The finished quilts. These are the three quilts for three siblings (or musketeers).
Quilt #1

Finished about 41" by 44"

Personality Plus

Fly away

Hop to it

Dude with 'tude

All cuteness

Wild one

Bold & Boyish

Polar Bear backing from Hawthorne Threads

Walking Foot Quilting

Quilt #2

Finished about 43" by 46"

Bird & Beautiful

Pink and Pinker

Aw...

Brightest Slippers ever

Rooting for the team

May the best team win

I love you too

Fluffy Plus

Sweetness

Cuteness

Brightness

Loveliness

Labelled

Walking Foot Quilting

Quilt #3

Finished about 41" by 42"

Snappy

So much fun

Puppies and Turtles

Adorable

And I am no wimp

Orange, Coral and Yellow - Love the colors

Monkeys make everything better

A baby elephant adds to the charm

Yay for the team!!!

Navy & Starry Backing

Walking Foot Quilting

Bound and Done

If you choose to make a t-shirt quilt or a quilt from onesies and baby clothes, these are a few important things
1. Use a walking foot even for piecing because the knit fabric + interfacing = bulk.
2. Press ALL seams open.
3. Use a wider binding. Instead of using 2.5" strips, I suggest using 2.75" strips. A little extra width helps capture those bulky seams with ease.

But quilts is not all I made from the baby clothes. I knew I would have fabric left over for three small pencil cases  - one for each musketeer.

Three Pencil cases for Three Musketeers

Ready for Stuff

Also I had plenty of fabric to make three pillow covers.  I chose to use binding to finish, instead of just stitching RST and turning it inside out. Yes, it takes more work but I wanted to do the very best for this mom of three.

Three Pillow covers

Pink Binding

I had a feeling that if the pillow covers did not have a pillow form inside, they may just be sitting in a closet and not get used.  To make sure that items could be used instantly, I bought pillow forms and inserted in each of the covers.  Besides fluffy pillows also look better in photoshoots :-D

Envelope Style

Soft and Ready to Cuddle

Is that all?  Well, almost.
Still some pieces were left and they were too precious to discard, since they already had the interfacing. So, I finished off with a few mug rugs.

Mug Rugs

And a very good morning to you!!!

I was paid handsomely for all my efforts. The best part, however, was the smile on mom's face.
Mission Accomplished.
I will be linking with all my favorite lanky parties.  As always, I'd love to hear from you.
Which one is your favorite quilt?