{A Quilt For Lincoln}

A co-worker of mine recently experienced the loss of a long-time, childhood friend of hers. His name was Gabriel and he left behind a sweet little family including a young daughter, a baby boy and a stay-at-home mom. She reached out for the help of friends and co-workers to get a care package together which included diapers, formula, clothes, and she asked if I would be interested in making a special blankie for the baby boy.

Lincoln was only 11 weeks old when his Daddy passed away, so we decided to make a simple quilt with Gabriel's name on it. It's something he can keep forever and hopefully, when he gets a little bit older, it will give him comfort when his Dad is not able to.

I backed the quilt with dimple minky fabric. It is SO soft and gentle. I thought, after I received it in the mail, that it would be difficult to work with, but I was pleasantly surprised. It's fairly light weight and didn't create any problems in my machine. I was really over thinking the "dimples" when I was trying to decide how to quilt it, that I should avoid them and maybe do straight line quilting. I'm glad I changed my mind last minute and just started stippling because I think it looks AWESOME, front and back! I did use blue thread on top and red on the back and I noticed red appearing through to the top of the quilt. I'm still unsure if it is the thread from the back or the fuzziness of the minky. (I like to believe the latter).

I did have a little trouble with some puckering on the back from the quilting. I used like 700 pins when I basted it thinking that it would prevent movement, but I still had some problems. (okay, really, I probably used about 100 pins :-) ) Does anyone have any basting advice? Do you use pins? Basting spray? What kind? Do you baste on a hard floor or carpet? Should the backing fabric be taped to the floor? Any help or tutorials would be greatly appreciated.

My thoughts and prayers are with Gabriel's family and friends.