Caillou Quilt #2

The original Caillou quilt

I never knew Caillou was so popular!  Since posting the last Caillou quilt on my blog, I have been visited by hundreds of people searching for Caillou quilts and blankets on the Internet.  I am flattered that so many people have stopped by to see what I made.  One of those wonderful people who was searching the web was a mother in California.  She contacted me to see if I would be open to making another quilt for her son's twin bed.  Of course I wanted to make another one!  

What I love so much about quilting is the level of creativity allowed.  You can find a pattern and follow it to the letter but depending on the fabric you choose, it can look totally different from the original.  This new Caillou quilt needed a few changes.  The boy that it was being made for shares a room with his sister.  Their walls are 4 different colors that all compliment each other very well.  However, the walls are not primary colors and Caillou is.  The original quilt I made would look horrible in this little one's room.   This mom asked me to focus on greens and blues and tone down the shades a bit.  No problem!

We set to work picking out colors....

Here are the original ones I picked.  I tried to keep the same color palate but lighten it up a bit. 

The customer really wanted to highlight the green and blue so she asked me to find two more tones to go with those and leave out the red and yellow.  No problem!  While I was searching, I began to embroidery the squares. I had to change Caillou's clothes a bit to tone down the colors and emphasize the blues and greens. 

 

The next step was to assemble it all. I really liked the dots that I found in the first picture so I kept those in there.  The colors in the dots were all found in the embroidery designs so it tied in really well.  For the quilting I had to keep in mind that this was for a little boy and he will be sleeping in it every night.  It needed to be durable!  For this sized quilt, I rented time on a long arm quilting machine at my local quilt shop.  (This, by the way, is my new love!)  I choose a stippling design which is kind of a rambling swirl going all over the quilt. 

Oh that machine is so much fun to use!  It cuts my quilting time in half (at least!) and does a much better job than my home machine would do.

Added a binding, washed it up, and we are ready to go!  Here is the finished product...