Make this snappy, I thought: no malingering or beating around the bush. You’ve got a birthday deadline.
This is Chris’ quilt, quilt #283 in the Index, it’s roughly 60″ by 72″– tall enough for him. My quilter turned it around in like a New York Minute, and I had it back out the door again a few days later, sending it on to him for his birthday.
I chose Mod Dots for the quilting: nice loop-de-loos around all those sharp angles and edges.
For the backing I used a pre-packaged quilt backing, liking the bursts of color against the sea of blues on the front. There are several airplane fabrics in there as he wants to be a pilot, but other than that, it was a scrap quilt all the way around.
I’ve learned to include a care label on quilts I give away.
He sent me a photo as a thank you!
This post is a contrast to the last one, showing you I do know how to do a quick quilt and like Mary, I can make it snappy.
Other Posts about this Quilt
Showing the blocks under construction, with the measurements so you, too, can do a snappy quilt full of love (I love working with HSTs and large blocks!)
This block, also known as Rolling Star (Brackman 3795) has several variations that are well-known. I’ve seen this block used in multiple quilts including mine, but what amazes me is how versatile it is just by changing up the colors and the center.
Here’s a line-up from one of my Home, Sweet Home classes — the quilts are similar, but different.
I changed up the center block and added seaming for windows and doors to get this one, after I saw so many quilters turn away from the fused doors and windows, wanting to seam them instead.
Several years ago I’d written a post where I talked about making up some block ideas for my neice-by-marriage, and I still can’t believe how popular the poppy block was from that post, but of course it was a free download and those are ALWAYS popular (I don’t mind). See Notes (at the end) for link to block.
So I thought I would slide down the sunflower rabbit hole this week, and finally get the sunflower version added to my Home, Sweet Home pattern:
I put the pattern on sale (now only $7 instead of the usual $12) as a way of making it easy (no coupons to enter), and hope those looking for this pattern will enjoy it.
Home, Sweet Home with Bonus 18″ Sunflower block available here.
But the rabbit hole of sunflower blocks got deeper and I decided to do a PatternLite pattern (costing less than a Pink Drink at Starbuck’s) with a changed-up method of piecing, to emphasize the petals of the sunflower. I also added a detailed series of instructions for a Four-in-One Flying Geese block, as well as how to trim it up accurately. I put a lot more in this one than usual, but I just kept going, making blocks and having fun.
About every other month, someone writes to me, asking if they can buy that sunflower pattern, which was an illustration on the Poppy Flower post (which was very popular in Australia). I popped it into a Google Search, trying to figure out what rando had taken off with my image, and found this:
It’s a sham website, ranking dead last in safety, in security. Don’t go there, but these guys are in the habit of stealing images and trying to sell them off to unsuspecting quilters (9 Pretty Barn Quilt Patterns for $42.88?).
Make this one, instead. It’s a lot cheaper!
Other posts about other Flower Blocks Poppy Block and debut of Sunflower idea with the free Poppy Block download April Flowers with a link to Totally Tulips Quilt from Missouri Star Field Flowers with a link to Sherri McConnell’s pattern Flowers for Emma June Flowers — a really early day post of mine, with a tutorial for a nine-patch tulip It makes me snort smile to see this post from nearly a decade ago. I still love Blossom, which has flowering snowball flower blocks in three sizes. Last, Sunny Flowers quilt, another PatternLite.
Hope that’s enough flower blocks for you. Since August is right around the corner, so many of mine in the garden have dried up with July’s heat. Guess we’ll just have to make them in fabric!
This teeny quilt on a frame was inspired by two things: this March pillow from Stash Fabrics (from Riley Blake’s Year of Pillows).
And because a dear friend of mine, who is by all rights and purposes is Irish (even though she was born and raised in the United States), has had a bad dose of it this year, and I didn’t want her to be forgotten on her favorite day. She’s the one who would hand out pots of shamrocks to her friends on St. Patrick’s Day. She and her husband have also gone to Ireland about a dozen times, and I never tire of her bopping out with phrases in the way they say them in Ireland. She gardens like no one else, loves saints and sinners and babies and her family with a fierce love, including her friends in that welcoming aura.
While I machine appliquéd the hearts on the pillow, I decided that for such a small project, I would fuse the hearts on.
I put a light crease at the halfway mark — both ways — to get those hearts perfectly centered.
A simple topstitch with green thread, then a white echo, then stipple everywhere else. I’ve learned not to get too “over-the-top” on the quilting with these tiny quilts: the design is the most important, not the quilting.
I cut my binding strips 1 1/2″ wide and use the single-fold binding technique (post is also found in the Tutorials, Techniques, and Freebies, above). I use a glue stick to get it into place, then topstitch down the binding 1/4″ away from the edge and no farther. This ensures that you can slide your picture frame into the pocket on the back.
This quilt started on Zoom. Several weeks ago as our family was having their weekly Zoom get-together, my brother hinted (strongly) that he wouldn’t mind having one of my quilts, you know, in blues–lots of them. He just loved blues.
It began with a block writ large. I used a basic nine-patch (see details below) that measured 12″ per block, so 4″ parts. It was a joy to work with blue and white, a favorite.
I have the above blue and white currently on the bottom of my bed, and must admit to having a lot of blue in my stash, so it was easy to pull fabrics for this quilt.
We’re lucky in June, out here in California, to have two flowering trees at the same time: the purple jacaranda, and the yellow Palo Verde. And I wanted photos with both.
My quilt-holding husband obliged. We stopped on the way home from church, and here you can see our nifty quilt-holding contraptions: a clamp duct-taped to a sturdy stick (you could use a dowel).
He received it yesterday and is thrilled to have it.
The Details
The block, pulled from my BlockBase+ software, is the Double Hour Glass block with a bit different coloration. I enlarged it to 12″ size, then went to town piecing it. The quilting pattern is Belly Bop, and my quilter Kelley used a silver Microquilter thread (#7007) on the top, and barely off-white 401 So Fine in the bobbin. Both threads are made by Superior Threads. The batting was Soft and Bright, by The Warm Company.
This is Quilt #249 in my Quilt Index of finished quilts.
OccasionalPiece--Quilt! 