Update: the soon to be parents loved the quilt! They were in shock it was handmade. I’m feeling better about the whole situation.

In the future I will either: 1. tell my partner to get their mailing address if the choice is rushing myself or enjoying the process / tell the recipient it’s gonna be late 2. REALLY check in with myself regarding if this feels like an “I want to” gift or an “I have to” gift. This was an “I want to” that turned into an “I have to” gift due to pain 3. (Joke) tell my work “excuse me, I have a gift quilt to finish this week, please keep your collective sh!t together”

To preface, I (28F) offered to make the baby quilt. My partner (28M) did not ask and nor suggest I make one. He also double checked with me that I actually wanted to make a quilt in a week and said there was no expectation from him to do this. (Edit: I agree with the comments, I over thought this situation. It feels bad because I imposed a deadline on myself even though I was unwell.)

My partner’s coworkers (soon to be mom and dad) are about to go out on familial leave for new baby! Yay! We are also just about to move and I have a LOT of scraps. The more I use, the less I move. And no need to spend money.

A week ago, my partner mentioned how he needed a baby shower gift for this Friday. My quilty, low impulse control brain started thinking about making an easy baby quilt.

And long story short, I started making one. I then had a week from hell and had three days of stress induced migraines. The idea was an easy, low stress quilt. I ended up working all evening to finish in time.

And as I was brushing my teeth I realized: - I don’t know these people - I won’t get to see their reaction - I took agency away from my partner to come up with his own gift - he isn’t giving them a gift, I am through him - this feels a bit like internalized sexism in that I took over the “woman’s” role of gift giving and planning - The impulse to make a baby quilt as an obligatory gift feels very close to the “must monetize my hobbies”. - overall, I feel weird about the whole situation

To make it feel less like he is contributing nothing, I asked him to get a “yay baby” card and write them a note. He said he would. I wrote a separate card that said basically “it’s your quilt now, idc if baby stains it, yay baby!”

I don’t know where I am going with this. This primarily feels like a learning moment for me. I wanted to make a quilt so I did. But with the same “something easy” attitude I could have made my cat a quilt (for him to ignore) and not had a time crunch. These people are lovely, I’m sure, but are the definition of not quilt worthy because I don’t know them.