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Butterfly Quilt Cover

After making Jacob’s Planes, Trains and Automobiles quilt (doona/duvet…) cover, I had to make a quilt cover for Celeste when she moved into her big girl bed. She was in baby sleeping bags last year. I had to make it before winter so she’d have something to sleep under!

Butterfly Quilt Cover (2)

I fell in love with the Spintastic fabric line by Laura Berringer for Marcus Fabrics (and featured it for Fav Fabric Friday), so I bought a big stack with a quilt layout similar to Jacob’s in mind. Most of the fabric was from Hawthorne Threads, with some extra prints from Hancock’s of Paducah.

This was one of those projects that took a LONG time, mostly due to procrastinating. It took 9 months after the fabric arrived to actually start the quilt. I wanted an applique design on the quilt, but I got it into my head that appliqueing is more difficult than it actually is, and just kept putting it off.

Butterfly Quilt

I started with a simple butterfly design. The more I cut out, the more fun I had fussy cutting the fabric to get the wings as symmetrical as possible. After finally sewing them , I debated whether I should bother with the antennae – hand embroidery is not my thing and I was worried that my machine embroidery skills would ruin all the work I’d done so far. Thankfully, my lovely Instagram friends convinced me to just do it. I’m (mostly) happy with how they turned out.

The layout of the butterflies took me another eon. I didn’t want a simple grid pattern and I kept moving them around trying to get the perfect layout. It was on my work table for more than a month before I committed to just sewing it.

Butterfly Quilt Cover (1)

I got there in the end. To make it look more professional, I made aqua piping as the border between the burgundy dots and the feature panel. I played around with the strips between the applique section and the butterfly print until I was happy with how it looked. The quilt cover is backed with pink flannel to make it nice and snuggly.

Pink Bedroom

I think she likes it, along with her new pink walls. The little monkey peeled off a big section of paint next to her bed because she didn’t want blue walls anymore (said very tearfully when Daddy told her off). Painting those walls was a huge saga thanks to the crappy job done previously – but that’s not today’s story.

And here’s the matching pillowcase – hmmm, I was sure I had a better photo than this…

Asleep on the Butterfly Quilt

I wondered if the colours are a little too grown up for a 2 (almost 3) year old girl, but I wanted a quilt that would last a few years and not be too baby-ish.

Overall, I’m happy how it turned out and wish I hadn’t procrastinated so much!It’s a nice feeling walking into both kids’ bedrooms and seeing my handiwork every day!

2 Comments

  1. This looks great! I love the coordinating pillow! Max got some butterfly patches that he wants to make something out of… Butterflies and boys, hmmmmm. No idea what to make! 🙂

  2. Hi Narelle, What a beautiful quilt! 🙂 I found your blog through the Blog Chicks September meet-up FB page. I smiled at your comment about being a bit nervous – I’m coming over to the event from Canberra, I understood what you meant completely! Hopefully this little pre-event get together is going to be a nice way to ease into the conference. Looking forward to having a chat 🙂

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