red part two: the finished redwork quilt

I've blogged the progress of the quilt some, and here it is, actually done. I started it when Eva was only 9 months old, and I was very new to quilting. I just fell in love with the folksy, yet detailed red stitching. When I was a stay-at-home mom during Eva's first couple years I used to watch Simply Quilts with Alex Anderson—I really think she taught me how to quilt—and I know she did an episode on redwork and I remember seeing some way back in a Country Living too, but, these were both after I had already started the quilt, so I'm not sure exactly why I decided to do a redwork quilt. I just did.

Here it is in situ.

It's a double Irish chain pattern and I hand quilted it all, but first I did the embroideries—thirty-one of them to be exact. Many came from this book (as did the pattern), but I started to get bored with them and some of them were just too old-fashioned and weird, so I started doing animals from a Dover book, plus a few literary characters (Little Bear and Mother Bear, Frances), and some random other animals. It's mostly animals, plus a nameplate and a lily of the valley. Oh, there's also the square that lists all the cats we know. I call that square The Becats.

It's odd. The quilt is already so old, even though it's just been finished, that it already has history in it. The pug dog has "Rosie" embroidered under it after my stepsister's dog who was alive then, but has gone now. Half of the Cats We Know are also gone, and we know a lot of new ones. I held off doing the signature block for a long time before I finally embroidered my name on it. Then, Elie and I got married and now my name is a bit different. It all makes me smile a little and maybe cry a little.

I had thought that there would be a moment of elation when I finished it and that I would put it on Eva's bed with great pomp and pageantry. But no. When it was done I left it on the couch for a while, until we had an extra chilly night and I used it to cover Eva up in bed. It had been living along with us that whole time I was making it. It has so many bits in it—all the years of my baby's life, all our progress. I like it a lot, and in the end, I'm surprised to say it was about the process.