My First Quilt

I started this quilt during the pregnancy of our sixth child. It was the first time I've ever made a quilt, and I decided to embellish it with embroidery. I came up with a design and then went to work. I picked out some fabric and cut it out, then sewed it into the initial block. Then I started working on the embroidery, then kept working on it, and kept working on it. Our sixth child, a son, was born and I was still working on the embroidery. He spent 11 days in the NICU due to premature delivery complications, and it was useful to have this work to distract me from some intense emotions. I eventually finised the embroidery. Then I added the striped fabric around the original block, and the next yellow strip. Finally, I put on the binding (after using information I found online to learn how to make the binding). I decided to handquilt it, so it took me quite some time after getting it all sewn together to complete it. I had never hand quilted anything, as you may recall this was my first time making a quilt. I tried the "rocking stitch" and had very little luck with it. So I resorted to stick and stab. It turned out much better that way, but did take much longer than I'd have liked.

Done