Celebrating the 4th With My Fourth Finally Finished Quilt

Our trip to the Grandparent House was delayed so we ended up spending the 4th at our house which meant I could finish my Mackinac Island Rows quilt which was the first RWB (Red White and Blue) quilt I started this year but was set aside for the other three RWB quilts I just posted. After all, it was time to finally have a quilt made from the Minnick & Simpson Prairie Paisley Fat Quarter Bundle purchased in 2008. 

I started this quilt back in March when I came across two Charm Packs of Minnick  & Simpson's Mackinac Island which may have been part of a Fat Quarter Shop Sew Sampler Box. I thought that I would either make a Jelly Charm Chase or Staggered Strips and Squares Quilt but thought the layout needed to be more controlled since I didn't have a large variety of strips from my Prairie Paisley Fat Quarter Bundle.  I added to this mix, two fat quarters of large floral prints and a homespun plaid once a pattern was decided.

I decided to make another variation of a Strips, Squares and Brick Quilt and drew a layout on my trusted graph paper.  You wouldn't think by looking at this quilt, a lot of planning on the color sequences of the rail blocks, squares and bricks went into this quilt.  I was lucky that I only had a certain number of rail blocks in certain combinations and there were enough of each to have a balanced layout.

Over the course of several months, the rail blocks rows and the brick strip were sewn.  They were assembled into five panels; three of which consisting of one brick strip of seven 4.5" x 8.5" rectangles  framed by a rail block row of seven 6.5”x8.5" rail blocks and two panels consisting of three rows of fourteen 4.5" squares each from the charm squares which were trimmed. This quilt measures 56" x 72".

You can see by this photo the two different layouts of the rail blocks, one with light blue,  red and light strips and the other with red, light, and dark blue strips and they were laid in a certain way to contrast with the brick strips and the charm square panels.  This is a nice and easy pattern and I have plans to make this again with other fabric collections from the past which I somehow bought a charm pack and yardage.  I also decided if I ever buy charm packs, I should buy at least two.

The machine quilting went well with the combination of straight and wavey lines in red thread.  Backing was the ticking stripe from the Prairie Paisley line.  I considered doing a wide 1" binding in the red stripe but decided the usual size would accent the blocks better.

Two little tidbits about the Minnick & Simpson and the Prairie Paisley bundles as I was preparing to write this post.  When I was figuring out how the Prairie Paisley fabric was purchased, I remembered how much I loved the fabric so I purchased both a fat quarter bundle and yardage. I knew the bundle was no longer intact when I started the Mackinac Island Rows quilt since some fabric was used and was wondering what I could have made with it.  Well, duh, it was the Snowball Quilt (top) and I only posted about it just five days ago.  It was a chuckle and head shake moment.  As to why it took me so long to finally make a quilt, it could be sort of a grudge against Minnick & Simpson for the 12" block they designed for Fat Quarter Shop's Moda Designer BOM in 2007/2008.  This is the BOM, my Quilt Peep Carol and I refer to lovingly as the Block of the Month from Hell and the Minnick & Simpson block is the one we always mention when we talk about it.  Would you believe there were 91 patches of half triangles, squares and one plain rectangle sewn together for the background and another 10 for the appliqué for the darling pail and flag which I fused and raw edged sewn by hand-a total of 101 patches. Sometimes I wondered if the Moda Designers were trying to outdo each other to see how many patches could be in their block. I never finished the quilt, (there are three blocks left and I can't remember where I put them) partly because it was full/queen size, definitely made to hang on the wall and fortunately for me there wasn't a wall in my house to accommodate it.  I thought of making two smaller quilts, one with the appliquéd blocks and the other with the pieced blocks.  They really are sweet blocks and maybe one day I will post them.

Here's another photo of the quilt.  At first, after the top was made, I thought I could wait until later to quilt it but the next morning I looked at the photo of the top and decided I needed to quilt  it now since I thought it would be nice to have it finally finished by the 4th. Plus, I once again have an SOS ("Seasonally On Spot") quilt-coined by Nancy of Grace and Peace Quilts. It just wouldn't be appealing to post this quilt in the Fall.  I will say my RWB mood has now left the studio.

Also, a confession, I reverted back the the Legacy Blogger for this post since I had a number of links I wanted to use and right now I have not figured out how to do this on the new Blogger Interface.  I can't wait for Sandra's, mmm quilts, in-depth tutorial.

I hope everyone had an enjoyable 4th of July.  It's now evening and the neighborhood is filled with fireworks.  I know one dog, Sophie, is not happy right now as well as some of the other neighborhood dogs.