Raggy Flannel Quilts

I've made at least a dozen more raggy flannel quilts since that first one for my friend's new son. In fact, when she adopted another little boy, he received one, too. Last summer, she commissioned me to make one for each of her nieces. That was a great creative exercise as I tried to match fabric and style with each girl's personality.

When I was in the hotel business, we used to joke about selling space for "meetings for two (persons) or more." I've heard decorators refer to the three-object rule -- once you have three similar objects, you have a fledgling collection.

Thanks to sales at Joann Fabric and random late-night online stalking sessions, my flannel collection has grown considerably over the years, particularly since I started making Project Linus blankets, primarily little flannel "sandwiches" for newborns and infants. A lot of the prints I have accumulated -- archived? -- feature baby animals and other juvenile themes.

But every once in a while, something like this has caught my attention.

I thought that was a fun, bright print. But I wondered if it would be too mature for a baby quilt.

Then, my daughter was accepted to a PhD program at LSU. Now, she's not a baby. And she's not having a baby (although, tick-tock, I'm not getting any younger). But I've never seen such fervent, nay, rabid, fans as LSU Tigers. They love their purple. Their gold. And their unique way of spelling Geaux.

Getting a little caught up in Tiger fever,  I thought I'd  make a baby quilt for the etsy shop (www.etsy.com/shop/quiltingmissdaisy). I think this polka dot pattern adds a lot of excitement to the overall look, and keeps it from being too sweet, too fussy, too relentlessy purple-and-gold.

The tiger faces and central motif that says, My first words Geaux Tigers, are courtesy of my new embroidery machine, which my hubby bought me for the holidays. (No, he didn't spend hours searching stores for the right machine, but sometimes it's the unfettered access to the credit card that counts.)

I have two more steps before I'm done: clipping and sewing.

Clipping used to be a tedious, arthritis-inducing job. Then I bought these fabulous little Fons and Porter rag scissors. They're designed to cut easily through multiple layers, and they snip the clipping time in half.