lyle's birthday

We had a nice evening celebrating Lyle's birthday with him on Thursday. We went out to eat (nothing fancy- Chik-fil-A! Everyone likes it and there is a play area, so off we went and I didn't have to cook.) then we came home and opened presents and had cake. He wanted "tiny" cakes but a big cake is easier for all of us, so I made 3 cupcakes in addition to the large cake. So he got to blow out 3 candles on each!








I was so excited to give him his "I Spy" quilt, and he likes it a lot. Although I think he likes his Lightning McQueen shirt and coloring book more... for now anyways.


He has enjoyed spreading it out and talking about all the stuff on it, and I'm sure he will come to like having it over him more as the weather cools down. For now it has been quite warm again so even that new shirt he got was making him sweaty. Not blanket weather yet!

Here are some more photos of the quilt- it was a lot of fun to make and it is far from perfect, but I know he will get a lot of use and enjoyment out of it.


There ended up being 99 squares, and since I made matches of each fabric that left me with one odd one. So I made one with his name to go in the center, and I love it. If I had come out with an even number I probably wouldn't have even thought of that.


The squares are about 3 1/2 inches across, and the entire quilt measures about 36" x 44". I made the back out of flannel, so it is soft and warm. I machine quilted it by stitching in the ditch, so that there wouldn't be any additional stitching on the front to make it more busy. I bound it with my favorite method of continuous binding, except I machine stitched the last edge instead of hand stitching it, mainly due to time constraints. I am very happy with how it turned out though, especially for a kids quilt that will be on the floor and washed a lot, and I will probably skip the hand stitching in the future more often. Like I said, there is a matching pair of each fabric, so it is like a game as well as a blanket. He has really enjoyed looking at all the designs and searching for the matches. Thank you again to everyone who sent me fabric way back last year- it helped make this quilt even more special and varied!