Dancing Snowflakes

 It's been so cold lately that this morning I was reminded of this limerick:

There was a young man from Quebec
Who was buried in snow to his neck.
When asked, "Are you friz?"
He replied, "Yes, I is,
"But we don't call this cold in Quebec."

Though personally, I would change it to Alberta, if it only rhymed with something appropriate. I don't know if Quebec gets the extreme cold temperatures that we do. Currently, at around 8:45 a.m., it's -20°C (about -4°F), but the forecast is for it to go down to -32°C (about -25.6°F) overnight. Fortunately, it's not too windy, so there's no significant wind chill factor. And at least it's not in the -40s. We do get those temperatures occasionally. 
I have been hunkering down at home, only venturing out once recently when Peter (my nephew that lives nearby) asked if I could take him to Walmart. Peter moved here from Victoria, BC, which is basically Canada's banana belt, about a year ago. He didn't even own a proper winter coat and boots because the winters are so mild there. And he doesn't have a driver's licence, because he didn't really need it in a big city with a good transit system. He's not afraid to walk - even in this frigid weather - but Walmart is a little far, especially if you have to turn around and carry your purchases home. Including an 18 kg (about 40 lb) box of kitty litter. 
My compost buckets are full, almost to overflowing, but I've been reluctant to get all bundled up just to carry them out to the composter. If the temperature were above -10, I would just throw on my boots and run them out there, without worrying about coat, toque, gloves... 
We've also had a little bit more snow and ideally, I would go out and clear that away. But I'm still debating on whether it's enough to justify braving the cold. It's not enough to run the snow blower. And my snow removal guy has not been very reliable lately...
Anyway, I'm still catching up on blogging about my Christmas projects. When I officially retired this past September, I got my vacation pay paid out, so I asked my daughter about getting my grandson a new bed. I bought him his first bed from Ikea years ago once he was out of his crib. It was a great bed for a young child as it was low to the floor, with a not very thick mattress. But it was no longer a great bed for a child of his age. So, I figured that this was likely the last time I would receive a relatively substantial sum of money all at once, now that I was retired, and offered to buy him a new bed for his Christmas gift. Of course he got it as soon as I bought it in the fall. But I still wanted him to have something to open on Christmas morning. Amongst his other gifts from Grandma, I made him this quilt, which I called Dancing Snowflakes. 

It's uniquely coloured for a Christmas quilt, and the fabric isn't necessarily specifically Christmas. The black and grey fabrics are snowflakes and the beige is reindeer and ivy. (I apologize for the fuzziness of the picture. It seems that the resolution on my camera is inconsistent). It was one of those situations where I wasn't sure if I was going to like the fabric combination. But I do. I love it. I find it very classy, and if this quilt hadn't been going to my grandson, I would have been tempted to keep it. 
The backing is a blue snowflake fleece/minky, which I've used before as backing on Let It Snow. It's deeper and softer than most minky fabrics I've used, and is oh, so cuddly, which my grandson loves. Even though he doesn't generally get cold at night, he loves the fleece sheets that I bought him. He just loves the snuggle factor. 

I used the Snow Winds pantograph for the quilting. As someone who owns 174 pantographs (with 8 more on the way), many of them have yet to be used and of the ones I have used, most have only been used once or twice. Snow Winds, on the other hand, I have used multiple times. I guess because it works well with so many Christmas and winter themed quilts. I only own two snowflake pantographs, the other one being Deb's Snowflake Meander. The quilting is a little more dense in that one, so not necessarily one I want to use with a minky backing. Plus it's 15.5" wide, which is really pushing the limits of the throat space on my Amara. I think I've only used that one once. I prefer to work with pantographs around 12" wide. 

The thread I used for the quilting was this Aurilux, which is a polyester thread that used to be made by Aurifil. I'm not sure why they discontinued it, but I bought quite a few mini cones in various colours when a thread vendor was selling it out. It's beautiful thread, but can be horrible to work with. It wasn't till I discovered that I needed to keep the quilt fairly loose on the frame when using variegated thread that I was able to use it successfully on quilts. And I still approach using it with trepidation. 
The pattern for this quilt is Button Box, from Fabric Cafe's book, "Quilts in a Jiffy". Have I mentioned how much I love 3-yard quilts? They are generally quick and easy and are the perfect size for snuggle quilts. 
And, of course, if you've been following my blog, you also know that I love to challenge myself with new quilting techniques, complex quilt blocks, etc., not just quick and simple. But right now, I should exercise. Normally, I try to do it before breakfast, but I got up late and I still want to fit it in...