All is Well That Ends Well

You may be wondering what ever happened with that elephant project (not really a quilt, just a blankie)  I was working on.  Here is the cutie patootey that it was made for.  This is Bailey Mae and her mama is an elephant lover.  She loved it! (thank goodness)  That is all that matters.  I'm so grateful because that blankie gave me fits!!  So many things went wrong.  I definitely learned a lot making this blanket.  But mostly that I should stick with quilts.  ;)

Here is what it looked like before I added the back on . . .

So far, so good, right?  Instead of a quilt, my plan was to just add on a plush back to the front with no batting so it would be light enough for a toddler to carry around with them.  Things went down hill from there.   Somehow, I did not get the front and the back lined up together and they were different sizes.  Which caused a multitude of problems.  Unfortunately, I didn't notice this until AFTER I had sewed a decorative stitch around the entire border.   I'm showing you the one little section that looks good because I'm totally embarrassed about the rest.  As you can see, it would have taken me a lifetime to pick out this border stitching to redo the back so I had to just leave it on, wrong size back and all.  (sigh)

Wouldn't you rather see more pictures of the Bailey Mae?  She was 5 lbs and 13 oz at birth.  

She was rarin' to get into this world and came quite early!

Ok, back to the sad story.   The other mistake I made (and I knew better) was that I forgot it's never a good idea to mix different fabric types on the top.  I used both flannel and cotton on the top.  

Here is how it looks after quilting and washing it.  Lots of unwanted creases and tucks.

 The edges tended to fold over the area where the decorative stitching was used.  I forgot you need stabilizer when you're doing that kind of stitching.  I quilted the gray area and that's all.  I left the elephants unquilted (I didn't have the heart to  quilt any more after I saw the mess I had made), just satin stitched around them with hot pink thread.  I was so disappointed in how that turned out, I told Bailey Mae's grandma that I would make her another one.  And I will!  But this time it's going to be a real quilt.  I'm no good at blankies.

One last picture of cutie pie and thus endeth the saga of the elephant blankie.  

Sweet dreams Bailey Mae!