My brother's wedding present!

I finally got to see my brother Chris this weekend (and meet his awesome fiancee, Jess), so I was able to give them their wedding present!  They are getting married this weekend, but I was too excited to wait even one more week to give them their gift!

For their wedding present, we (my parents & two of my brothers went in on it with me) gave them a picnic basket and a water-resistant picnic blanket that matched the picnic basket liner.  I bought the picnic basket and then made the liner & blanket.  I am so happy with how it turned out!  I just randomly had an idea one day and then got SO excited about it, so I just rolled with it... but then pretty much as soon as I started, I realized I had NO idea what I was doing.  I used a couple tutorials to help me, and then I just made up the rest as I went along.  I made a ton of mistakes that I either had to re-do or find a way to cover up.  For example, the dark blue edge around the blanket was not originally planned.  I added it to cover up my seams around the edge of the blanket, because they weren't straight and it was driving my crazy. But I love love LOVE the edge so much, so I am glad that I screwed up the seams and had to add the blue.  I think it really helped make the blanket look more finished.

 

I originally wanted it to be a waterPROOF picnic blanket, because it's SO annoying when you sit outside on damp ground and your butt gets wet, so I thought it would be awesome to have a picnic blanket that you could use on damp ground without worrying about water getting through!  But after talking to a couple women at the fabric stores and looking at my options, I realized that my only waterproof options couldn't be put in the dryer.  And I wanted the blanket to be able to be washed and dried, especially since it was 3 layers.  (I had the water-resistant bottom, a layer of fleece in the middle to make it more like a blanket, and then the cotton print on top).  So I found a fabric that can be washed and dried, and while it isn't waterproof, it is at least a little water-resistant, so hopefully it will still kinda do what I want it to!

I tied the layers together like you do with a quilt, but since it wasn't made with lots of little squares like a quilt is, I didn't want straight lines of ties every few inches.  I felt like it would look stupid with the pattern and just ruin the whole thing.  So I got embroidery thread in the navy blue, orangey/yellow, and purple colors of the centers of the flowers, and then I tied the blanket in the middle of all the flowers.  And the colors were so perfect--they matched so well that you can hardly see the ties!

I also used some extra fabric to make long strips, and then I sewed them to one corner of the blanket.  So it can be folded and then rolled up and tied.  It rolls up into a pretty small bundle, so that makes it easier to carry around!

And here is a picture of Naomi, because she wanted to be a model for one of the pictures!

It is far from perfect, and I'm sure other people could have found a better way to do it, but I don't care.  I love it! :)