Life’s certainties

The only certainties in life, the saying goes, are death & taxes. Whoever said this obviously had never had a child, and so I would respectfully suggest an alteration:

“The only certainties in life are death, taxes, and newborn poo when out & about!”

When my sister-in-law recently announced she was expecting, my mind went into overdrive trying to think of an appropriate gift to celebrate this new life joining our family. Having been somewhat recently on the wrong end of an explosive nappy, I felt possibly a custom-made changemat might be an ideal solution. I made it quite large, and added a pocket large enough to hold a nappy & a packet of wipes, just perfect for chucking in the bottom of the pram.

The whole thing is padded with wool wadding I had leftover from a previous quilt. THe top two-thirds are quilted around the small chocolate triangles, and the bottom third, which is PUL for easy cleaning, isn’t quilted, save for a single row of top stitching where it joins the patchwork, just to help it lay properly. The back is also chocolate PUL, again, easy to wipe down after being on icky public change tables, and the binding is PUL as well. I chose PUL over a completely waterproof PVC cover so that it would be gentler on tiny bottoms. I thought PVC may be cold & sticky, whereas the PUL is a lot lesy plasticky (is that evene a word?). I’m quite happy with how it turned out, and am thinking I may need to make myself one as well.

Stay tuned – the Jacob’s Ladder quilt was finished last night, so once the boy has finished sleeping under it, I’ll take some photos to show!