quilted snuggle blanket with minky

I have a toddler that started sleeping well just recently, so I will do anything to keep her in her bed longer.  When the weather (finally) started to cool off here in Southern California I noticed that she was waking up cold.  So off we went to my favorite fabric store and once she saw this minky she actually started cuddling it on the fabric bolt.  That made the decision pretty easy.

It would have been really easy to make a blanket with minky on both sides, but I was worried that would be too warm.  And the only fabric I could find in the coral color I wanted was in the batik section.  So I knew I would have to do a quilting backing for the blanket because the minky is much wider than the batiks.  

The lady that was cutting my fabric was super helpful and cut the smallest pieces possible to get the squares I needed for quilting.  One yard of minky measured 60" x 36" so I needed 15 of the 12.5" batik squares to quilt the backing.  And in the end, with all of the fabric bunching and stretching and trimming, the finished blanket measures 57" x 35".  

The snuggle blanket started working its magic before I could cut off all the loose threads!

When it comes to sewing, I would describe my style as lazy (on a good day).  But this blanket was finished in less than 2 weeks, cost less than $35, and was completely designed and finished by me.  I am awesome!  But really, it was easy:

• Buy fabrics. Easy!
• Quilt the backing together
• Pin together with right sides facing in
• Sew along the edge and leave an opening about 6" wide
• Gently pull the blanket back through the opening
• Top stitch about 1/2" from the edge and make sure your opening is securely sewn shut
• Sew small X's on along each of the 8 interior quilted seams
• Done!

I sewed small X's along the interior seams to keep the two sides of the blanket together.

The X's on the reverse side blended really well.  Would have been even better if I had changed the bobbin thread,

I drew a layout of the quilt pattern before I got started.  And there weren't very many scraps left at the end!

What do you think?  Hope you're having as much fun as I am checking things off of my project list!

UPDATE 11/16/2012:

I went back to Beverly's to figure out the fabrics I used in this project.  It turned out the the "minky" is actually from Shannon Fabrics' "cuddle" line.  This print is called Ibiza Cuddle Olivia.  The batik prints I used are from Hoffman Fabrics and Batavian Batiks.  I included pictures below in case you want style numbers.