Of those of you who know me personally, you know how big of a Braves fan my husband is, so for fathers day/ my husbands birthday this year, I've decided to create a quilt just for him. Let me start off my saying that this quilt is a BIG pain in the butt, like many of my quilts are, but I have high hopes for it's outcome! Unfortunately, my sewing machine likes to give me a ridiculously hard time when it comes to the zig-zag stitch required for applique, but I am trying my best to make due with the machine I have (without ripping my hair out, or throwing my machine across the room in frustration), and thanking God - upon encountering each hiccup in stitching - that my husband is a simple man. Amen for that! Showing my quilting mother-in-law my work is another matter entirely, but my husband... well, he's happy with anything. God bless the simple man!
Anyway, my entire idea was based quite simple around the Braves logo, which I would like to make the main focus of the blanket.
Doing so, I had to blow up and puzzle piece together the logo to be approximately 20"x40", to be the center focal point of a 60"x80" blanket. For relative ease (HA!), I decided to split the logo into 2 parts, the name and the tomahawk. After blowing up the images (a 2 day process) I then traced the logo(s) onto wax paper in 3 parts, the white, the blue, and the red, which is now being appliqued one right on top of the other, using my machines dodgy (yes I just said dodgy! ;) ) zig zag stitch. God help keep me sane! Currently I am working on attaching the red braves logo to the the blue outline, and will post pictures as soon as that phase is finished. While the stitching is far from perfect, and I am not fussing to do any extraordinary applique technique, the effect is still very nice, and eye catching.
Ok, so you may be wondering what is going to make up the remaining 40"x40" of background to fill my 60"x80" blanket, after the main logo is complete. Well.... I pondered this one for a while myself. I knew I wanted to do some kind of border, with the possibility of utilizing square tiles with something significant and relevant, but what? Initially I thought, "wouldn't it be cool if I could get signatures from the players on fabric squares?," but then quickly dismissed that idea, knowing that since I am not a 10 year old boy, the chances of me getting my fabric signed by major league baseball players would be slim to none. So I began thinking of a new idea, equally as amazing. And you know what?? I think I found it!
For those of you who do not know, these are alternative, and in a couple cases, outdated, logos of the Atlanta Braves. My idea is to create a border around my blanket that is comprised of 10"x10" squares, with the center being an alternative logo for the team, and finished off with a 1" mitered border in red. I think it would look pretty neat myself. I am assuming for now that this would be done by applique as well, with the exception of the Indian brave, which would probably be easiest just to print onto fabric paper... not as neat, but would come out looking a heck of a lot better than me trying to applique him to a piece of plain fabric.
In using 10"x10" squares, I would need 24 squares total. For the corners, I also plan on appliqueing hand laced baseballs into those squares, which I think would add a nice touch to the blanket. That would then leave me needing 20 squares of logo applique, which if I just use the five shown above, would repeat 4 times around the border. Additionally, with the border being 10"x10", that takes 20"x20" off the entire blanket, which would then leave a 40"x60" center, the background of which will be blue, with the logo shown at the top of this post being 20"x40"... if my math is correct, that would leave 20"x20" of blanket space. I think that sounds fairly proportional.... I think! ;) lol.
Anywho, that's the plan; I'll keep you updated on the progress of the blanket, and upload some photos as soon as phase one of the logo applique is done.... that is, of course, if you all promise not to make fun or criticize my "dodgy" stitching! :)
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