Blast Off, Baby Luke!

At the risk of having you all think that this has turned into an exclusively crafty blog, I want to post one more project that I worked on over the Christmas holidays. Last summer when Benjamin and I went to Spokane, I absolutely had to go to Jo-Ann's. I found all sorts of great fabric on sale and brought it home, even though I had no sewing machine and had no idea what I would do with the fabric. Once I got my sewing machine in October, though, I decided it was time to put the fabric to good use and started making a baby quilt with some adorable fat quarter bundles I got that had a little spaceman theme. Check out the patterns, aren't they awesome?

I especially love the one with the alien googly eyes and the little boy in the flying saucer with the three-eyed alien.

While I was working on this quilt, I had a phone conversation with my sister Katey, who is expecting. She already has three boys and although she and my brother-in-law insist quite truthfully that they would be ecstatic no matter what the gender of their next baby was, I kind of knew they both thought a little girl would be nice. I told her that if their fourth did turn out to be a boy, then at least they could count on getting an awesome spaceman quilt for him.

Katey found out that they are having a boy (with a delivery date coming up pretty quick, I'm really excited!) and I promised her the quilt. What was even more perfect is that they are naming their baby Luke. And his parents are big Star Wars fans (maybe Jason more than Katey, but I know at least that Katey likes Star Wars). They are very keen to point out that their baby will not be named after a certain main character from the movies, but I think it's appropriate that Luke have a space blankie.

They were going to be in town over Christmas, so I had to stop procrastinating and put the top together with the batting and backing and quilt it and bind it before they came. This is my first binding ever (the only other quilt I've finished was a simple turned inside out edge) and I have to say I really enjoyed it. It didn't take nearly as long as I though it would (probably more because of its size than anything else) and it turned out really nice. The backing and the border is a really nice soft flannelette that is so snuggly, I almost wanted to keep the quilt for myself. I hope baby Luke likes it!