Tuesday 19 April 2011

Starting the pink cross quilt

I had no intentions of working on another quilt anytime soon with all of the commissions I've had recently. Honest. But when I read Elizabeth Hartman's (of my fave quilting blog Oh, Fransson!) post about a Quick-Piece Tiny Squares quilt over at Sew, Mama, Sew I absolutely had to try it. You have to admit, the concept is pretty alluring: patchwork piecing hundreds of tiny scraps into a beautiful quilt without spending ages doing it!

I promptly dug through my handy dandy bag of scraps and pulled out all of the pinks I could find. Don't ask me why I went for pink. I hate pink. Collectively though, even I have to admit, these squares look stunning.


Following Elizabeth's suggestion, I laid out my cut squares (2.5" x 2.5") in a grid pattern atop some light-weight fusible interfacing and ironed everything down. What I like about this technique is that you don't have to be completely precise about your cutting and placement -- a little overlap is just fine as long as you're rows are pretty straight over all. Once you stitch down each row and column, all of your seams will match up perfectly and any overlaps or gaps you had will be hidden in the seam allowance.


So, just how quick is this project? I was able to cut out all 315 squares in one night, and iron and stitch the entire quilt top the following evening. It's now sandwiched waiting for me to begin hand quilting. I'm not sure how that's going to go since the interfacing adds a bit of bulk, but we'll see. I'll post more pics as the project moves along.

P.S. I will likely be selling this quilt once it's complete (assuming it turns out okay). If you might be interested in purchasing it for yourself or as a gift, please message me at heymilkybeer [at] gmail [dot] com. The finished quilt will be approximately 30 X 42 inches.

4 comments:

  1. i LOVE this pattern - it looks so beautiful and i'm always in awe of your quilting skills.

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  2. I was very intrigued by this method. Sounded right up my ally...I like anything that speeds up the process without sacrificing the finished look. Though, in my head, I can't see how the squares end up actually being sewn together. Or do they? Do all the raw edges get sewn to the other? Is it obvious and I'm just dumb? :) Guess I'll just have to try it out and see. That kind of things tends to make much more sense to me as I do it. The quilt is going to be beautiful. The pinks are lovely together.

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  3. @miranda
    Thanks Miranda! You're such a sweetheart. Your quilting skills are none too shabby yourself!

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  4. @Katie
    Oh Katie, it's so easy and I'm sure you'll pick it up quickly...after ironing all the pieces down, just fold the rows of squares together right side facing and sew along that fold with the usual seam allowance. Once you've done all the seams, you have a beautiful quilt top!

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