Beginning of New Quilt--Darned Cute

Several years ago I got a Christmas catalog from the Chicago Institute of Art. A woman who trained at the Institute, named Linnea Riley, designed holiday cards for the catalog that featured cats in amusing poses. I drafted a couple of blocks from her card designs to transform into a quilt at some date in the future. Yesterday and today I have been working on the first block.

I still have to blindstitch the trees to the background, complete the blindstitch on the cat's paws, and add some more embroidery to make the cat's features show up better. When completed this is going to be a four block quilt with sashing and a border. There is another Linnea Riley cat card that features a striped cat eyeing some mistletoe that will be the bottom right  block. The alternate blocks are an ornament and a wrapped gift. The border I am planning is a string of Christmas lights with perhaps a mouse in there somewhere.After three bed sized quilts in a row, it is fun to have a project that moves quickly. The blocks are all about 12 x 15 so the finished quilt will be somewhere around 50 inches square with the sashing and the border.