Again, I chose to use dress shirts as well as additional fabrics that corresponded with the overall colour scheme I was aiming for.
As you can see in the photo below, there are seven different fabrics. I ended up using them all except the bright red solid, had it been a cherry red I would have used it.
I will now take you on a photo journey of the process of making this quilt.
The fabrics I started with, minus the solid red.
Here is the preliminary drawing of the quilt.
Notice the extra penciled in row at the bottom of the page, this row will be inserted in the center of the quilt giving 5 rows across by 7 rows down.
I did this to create symmetry without having an immediate repeat.
Now, notice in the drawing above that the solid red fabric was to be a border.
I cut out all of the solid red pieces, not realizing at this point that I wouldn't like it.
(Before sewing all the squares together, I did a dry fit where all the pieces get arranged together to see how they look....YUCK, I don't like it).
I will show you what that actually looked like later on.
In the 2 photos below, you can see all of the pieces have been cut out.
Now I can begin pinning the fabric pieces together into their individual squares, sewing and then of course pressing every seam.
Now that the sewing and pressing are finished, I can proceed with the dry fit.
I moved all of my furniture out of the way and began piecing all of my squares and the solid red border.
Here are 3 progression photos of the quilt with the border.
See what I mean?
The solid red border isn't conducive to the vintage feel of the rest of the quilt.
Now I will show you what it looked like without the border, I found this layout much more pleasing to the eye.
Now I begin pinning all of my squares together so that I can sew the whole top together.
NOTE: The layout above was my intended design.
Due to a sewing error, I ended up with a slightly different layout but I loved it just as much.
Here I have all of my rows pinned and rolled up ready for sewing.
The quilt top is now all pieced together, seams have been pressed and all I have to do now is back it with my chosen fabric.
The fabric I chose for the back of this quilt is the same as the backing on my husbands quilt, the only difference is that I reversed it so that the colours would appear more muted.
Here are some photos of the finished quilt, you will see the front, back and also the thick cotton threads I use to tie the layers together.
And finally, here it is all neatly folded and ready to give.
I hope you enjoyed this post as much as I did.
Until next time, happy crafting.
