You know how sometimes you have an image in your head and it all just comes together? Well, that is not at all what happened with this quilt.
This blanket is for a friend having twins. I already made the Star Spangled baby blanket for the baby boy and I wanted a similar but not identical quilt for the girl.
I had a picture in my head of a happily colored scrappy star blanket in which the white and colors would alternate from block to block in a checkerboard pattern. The first block would be a multi colored background with a white star then the next would be a white background with a multi colored star and so on.
In my head it worked so well and so I got to work. Here are my color choices.
Those colors look so happy together! I love how they look like a summer picnic with the checks and flowers. With all the colors being pulled from the camper fabric I just knew it would come together just as I had intended.
My little blocks were cut to 3.5 inches. I needed 48 colored and 48 white.
I cut 12 squares of the colors and 12 white at 8 inches each to make the points of the stars. I drew diagonal lines on the back of the white squares then placed a color square and a white square right sides together. A 1/4 inch seam was sewn on both sides of the diagonal lines.
I cut the square in half both vertically and horizontally to make four squares. Those squares were then cut on the marked lines to make eight triangles.
Those open up into half triangle squares. Before opening and pressing I trimmed them so that they would make a 3.5 inch square.
Once I had all my pieces ready to go I set out to arrange them as I had pictured in my head. Much to my disappointment it was too busy. The pattern was getting lost with the background and stars changing from colors to white from square to square.
I arranged and arranged. I asked the kids for their opinions. They agreed that it was too busy. I tried putting the same colors together in small sections so that it wouldn’t be quite so busy.
Hazel finally had enough and had to put her foot down. Someone had to tell me to just put it away for a while.
After a few days of pondering I had the idea of making the stars white and the background colors in random patches. After a few tries I settled on this arrangement.
I think it looks kind of like a flower garden with the bunches of various flowers blending into each other.
The pieces were sewn into blocks.
Once the blocks were made and trimmed up I was able to make the top and put the quilt together.
So, even though it didn’t turn out as I had originally planned, it still turned out pretty cute. I think it looks perfect for a baby girl to one day have a teddy bear picnic on.
And just one more picture for good measure.
Thank you for joining me on my last quilting journey in South Korea. We move in five days. The kids and I will be hanging with family for a few weeks in Washington before my husband joins us and we move to The Netherlands!
My computer refused to connect to the internet last summer while we were there so I may not be able to post anything for a few months.
Hope to see you all again once we get settled in!
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