And Now For a Magic Trick: The Disappearing Nine Patch

Now that I have mastered a simple quilt style  I have decided to move on to something more complicated, the Disappearing Nine Patch.  (Thanks to my friend Beth for mentioning this pattern to me)  A very good tutorial for this quilt style is found here.
This is a small quilt (54 x 54 in) for my little daughter.  I have selected from my stash of Asian fabrics and picked out some Kawaii inspired animal prints from Spoonflower designers and, of course, added one of my designs.  Like Allison mentions in her tutorial, I eyeballed the middle cuts for the nine patch.  I really recommend measuring it---if you look, you can see where some of my seams are off.  I actually quilted this one since it was so small but will hiring someone with a longarm machine when I sew larger blankets.
Spoonflower designs in my quilt:

A. Protea Petals Pink by bloomingwyldeiris
B. Cute Creatures by indescribble
C. Cherry Blossom Bambi Pink Aqua by zesti
D. Super Cute Kawaii by marcelinesmith
E.  Run Bumbi Run by killer_tomato

The next quilt top will likely be for Margaret for all of her help cutting out squares.  I will begin cutting my younger son's material as well.  He is going for a watery theme.

Four Mediums For Merbabies

A couple of posts ago I mentioned hosting a ATC exchange on Swap-bot.  Here are the results of my work.  From the many ideas I initially sketched, I decided to create my cards experimenting with different materials.  The first card completed was the colored pencil and ink drawing of the merbaby playing with his tail on the lower left.  The second one is the merbaby hiding behind her mommy (upper left.)  This is done in oil pastel and I like the pastel's watery effect.  The third, in the lower right corner) is a cut paper and ink merbaby playing with a starfish.  I was going for a Charlie Harper feel, reminiscent of his piece, Otter Delight.  (Browse this commercial site for more of his work)  The forth, upper right, is an ink and watercolor drawing inspired by Disney's Silly Symphonies-cartoon shorts created between 1929 and 1939.  Check out the cute video.