June Island Batik Modern Challenge

The June challenge for the Island Batik Ambassadors was to make a Modern Quilt.  For this quilt project I used the Sunflower Serenade Collection that was sent in my first Ambassador box of fabric this year.

 I dearly love this collection.  My box had a collection of fat eights to work with.  This was a challenge as I wasn't sure how far they would go, but I really wanted to make something with them

*****FYI  I've worked with some of these fabrics before!  Look for my quilt in the Nov/Dec issue of Quiltmaker Magazine.

Many modern quilts use bright fabrics, so this collection would work.  I had enough of Island Batik Sprinkles to use as a light background, which would make the colors pop.

I choose the X Plus block pattern that has been very popular lately.  This was a good block that can use a wide variety of fabrics.  I used all but 3 or 4 fabrics in the whole collection.

This is a  very easy block to  make.  I decided to made the corner blocks by paper piecing- just because that is easy and accurate.  The blocks and sashing go together easily.  I decided to use the darker  fabrics for the sashings which gives a sort of grid work to the design. 

The quilt finished as a lap quilt 38" x 47".  Since many modern quilts have no borders, I finished it with a scrappy binding.

I really love the colors in this collection.

For the quilting I used the Westalee Straight edge ruler and the 4" arc.  Those are two of my favorite Westalee rulers.

You might want to check out the other Ambassadors posts for making Modern Quilts this month:

Busy Hands Quilts 
Freemotion by the River 
Quilting Affection Designs 
Bejeweled Quilts by Barb 
Clever Chameleon 
Mania for Quilts 
Steph Jacobson 
Inchworm Fabrics 
Moosestash Quilting 
BeaQuilter 
Carole Lyles Shaw 
HeARTs Creations 
Sew Karen-ly Created
If These Threads Could Talk 
The Quilt Rambler 
Slice of Pi Quilts 
Creative Blonde 
Vicki’s Crafts and Quilting 
Patterns by Jen 
Powered by Quilting 
Quilt in a not-Shell 
Curlicue Creations 
Little Bunny Quilts 
MMM Quilts 
Sweetgrass Designs 
Living Water Quilter

Book review winner

The winner of the Mini-Charm Quilts ebook is Jody.  The winning number was drawn by Random.org

Book Review and Giveaway - June

If you regularly follow my blog, you know by now that I love mini quilts.  Martingale has a new book called Mini-Charm Quilts  18 Clever Projects for 2 1/2" squares.

Photos are courtesy of Martingale

Martingale asked 18 of their designers to design a quilt using 1, 2 or 3 of their mini charm pack of squares.  Mini charm packs are a quick and easy way to gather pre cut squares - but don't we all have 2 1/2" squares just waiting to be used?  Lots of inspiration here on how to use them.  

A couple months ago I asked readers what color they had the most of in their scrap stash.  Many said blue.  Here is a cute little quilt that would use up a lot of those scraps.  This is called Spare Time by Lisa Bongean.

Another cutie is this heart pillow covered with cross your heart x's.  It's called Cross My Heart Pillow by Brenda Riddle.

This little quilt is so bright and cheerful.  Four Patch Chain is by Barbara Groves & Mary Jacobson.  I think this pattern would make a cute baby quilt.

Save those little squares- there are loads of things you can make with them!  If small projects aren't your thing- I'm sure you have a friend or two that would love to have them!

Look for Mini-Charm Quilts in your local shop or purchase online at shopmartingale.com

Martingale gives all the royalty funds for this book to LOCK-9 Comfort Dogs.  Isn't this a great way to support a special organization!

***Giveaway***

I'm having a drawing for a free ebook.  Let me know in the comments what size scraps you like to save.  I'll announce the winner early next week.  Be sure that I can contact you if you are a winner.

Bridesmaid Baby Blanket

Have you heard about making old bridesmaid dresses into baby blankets?  It is a growing trend as you can see if you look into it on Pinterest.  I wasn't aware of people doing this until  my daughter asked me to make one from a bridesmaid dress she had worn.  The "bride" was having a baby and as the dress no longer fit my daughter, this seemed like an interesting idea!

I didn't think to take a picture of the dress before I started.  It was a slim, halter top, floor length dress.  Luckily the dress was a single layer of fabric and not layers of thin filmy fabric.  I'm not sure, but I think it was some kind of polyester.  The hardest part was cutting into the dress and taking it apart!  My daughter is thin and the pieces of the dress were tapered up the sides, so there wasn't as much usable fabric as I had expected.

I decided to do a simple quilt with squares as I wasn't sure how much the fabric would fray, and how it would quilt.

I decided to make the alternate squares a soft white fleecy fabric that baby's love to feel.  So the blanket has the soft white and the slick pink fabrics to feel.  My daughter picked out a fleece baby blanket on sale for less than the cost of backing, so we went with that for the back. The colors coordinated really well.

It turned out very nice.   I did very simple straight line quilting that worked well to secure the dress fabrics.

It is a pretty neat idea - you might want to give it a try!