Another happy birthday!

I have been fooling around with the Hex N More ruler making braids out of the half-hex shapes, and I realized that GIANT half hexes would be fun to do as a single full-spectrum run. And thus the idea was born to make a growth chart for someone special who just turned One this week! I have the cutest alphabet panel that I used to make the hexagons (thanks to Lynn's suggestion!) with her name. I quilted a very tight meander in the background, around the name lettering, and simple echo lines in each half-hex using a matching thread for each. At this point, once the "squinching in" was complete, I very carefully marked the inch lines one foot at a time, and stitched them with 12-wt Sulky thread, switching colors to match the colors of the number hexagons, which I then appliqued OVER the background quilting. I left some stiff interfacing in the numbers, so they wouldn't collapse into the meander lines behind them. From a technical perspective, the only thing I would do differently if I made another one of these is to use 30 half hexes instead of only 28. There's kind of a large open space at the top. But from a regular person perspective, I absolutely love how this came out!! You could mark the heights either with a fabric marker like a Micron pen or a Crayola, OR you could embroider them on with some plain old DMC floss. Happy birthday, Phoebe!!

Detail of the top. Also, I am experimenting with copyright watermarking.

Quilted growth chart!

I also sent Phoebe her very own tote. Little kids -- girls and boys alike -- really like putting things in bags.