This baby quilt is a commissioned project that utilized a lot of the 2 1/2" squares that I had cut from my scraps recently.  In fact, all of these colored squares except for 4 came from my pre-cut scrap bin - which feels great!

I pieced this quilt in a slightly-unusual way: 2D piecing (my name for it).  I laid the quilt out on my design wall, and then when everything was the way I wanted it, I gathered the vertical rows in to piles. I sewed vertical row A to row B like you would for normal chain-piecing. But then instead of cutting them apart, I then took the first blocks (top of the rows) and sewed row C to the AB units. When I got through all the blocks in row C, I then sewed row D to the ABC units. Make sense? When all of the vertical seams were done this is what I had: (see below).

Normally at this point I would stop and press all the seams in alternating directions so that the squares would nest.  However, I decided not to press yet: I just used my fingers to make sure the seams were going the right directions as I sewed horizontal row by row together.

I worked from the top down (though it really doesn't matter what is up or down), and stopped in the middle for the above picture.

When all the seams were sewn, I pressed everything all at once and was done with the top! The above picture shows the assembled quilt top prior to pressing.

I quilted it with diagonal straight lines through all of the white blocks (and there fore through the center of the plus), backed it in an adorable sunshine print from Erica Hite's Nursery Rhymes for Windham Fabrics, and bound it in an old text print by Laurie Wisbrun.

Quilt Stats:
There are 437 2 1/2" squares in this quilt and it measures approximately 38" by
46". 

February was a much bigger quilting & sewing month for me than January was- and it felt great. I went to my first QuiltCon in Savannah, GA and it was such a big experience. The convention had so many different aspects!  I enjoyed seeing all the quilts, taking a few classes, volunteering, meeting some quilty friends in person, and hearing a few lectures.

Quilts:  Seeing the quilts in person was a very interesting experience. Some of them were quilted so much more than I was expecting after seeing pictures of them. Some were bigger than I was anticipating - and so many were so much smaller than I had pictured.  It was also interesting just seeing what had been accepted in to the show; some were simple and some were so crazy complicated.  And did I mention the quilting? I was really surprised by how much so many of them were quilted:  "Quilted to Death" as Angela Waters (the keynote speaker) described. 

Classes: I took one class per day (and was thankful for the classes that I was able to get in to). Thursday I did Lino Printing with Karen Lewis, Friday was "Making Cat Faces" with Melissa Averinos, and Saturday was "Improv Theme & Variation" with Denyse Schmidt.  You can see pictures of the cats I made at the top of this post. Let me say: that was a very fun class. Melissa is a huge cheer-leader constantly saying "You can do it - that's so cute." So positive and encouraging! I can see myself making more kitties in the future. 

My class with Denyse Schmidt was the first class where I actually sewed at QuiltCon and it felt good.  It was interesting to see how she lead us though an introductory exercise and then set us free with instructions to discard our rulers and rotary cutters for free-hand cutting with a scissors instead.  However once I started in on my idea for this class, I realized that I needed a lot more fabric. So I went shopping at the vendors during lunch. More on that to come below.

Lectures: I didn't attend that many lectures, but I did enjoy those that I did attend - especially the keynote speech by Angela Waters. She's such a vibrant engaging speaker; she made me want to try free-motion quilting right away (something I've never really liked doing).

Volunteering: Friday I ended up with a lot of free-time in my schedule, so I decided to volunteer. Last year I read someone's blog post saying that they had really enjoyed volunteering, so I signed up.  Wow - did I enjoy it.  I was posted at the registration desk and loved it! I learned a bunch, and felt really appreciated. Next year I hope to volunteer a lot more.

So...fabric reconciliation.  This was a month of accumulation.  I did made a mini quilt for the MQG Swap, and worked on the first round of our "I wish I could go too traveling quilt bee" blocks (see Instagram for what I made or #iwishicouldgotootravelingquiltbee). However most of my fabric usage/purchases revolved around QuiltCon.

I DID take a lot of fabric to QuiltCon to use in classes. But I also bought a lot of fabric there when I realized that I didn't have what I wanted for my Denyse Schmidt class, and brought a lot of un-used fabric home (the fabric that I had brought for classes). Here's where things stand for February:

Fabric Purchases: 27 yards (all at QuiltCon)
Fabric Usage: 15 yards
Net: 12 yards gained this month

Total for the year: 10.25 accumulated