By Rose Smith, Ludlow Quilt and Sew
Do you find yourself picking up fat quarters of fabric because you love the fabric?
Do you then find that you're not sure how to use them?
Yep, that's me. I have loads of fat quarters that I've picked up over the years, but somehow they are never quite big enough for any projects that I do.
So, I decided that it was time to think up a fat quarter quilt so that I could showcase some of my fat quarters.
I made a lap quilt measuring 40" square using the Building Blocks quilt block. I used four fat quarters. Each fat quarter was used to make one Building Blocks quilt block, one piece of sashing and the rest was used in 2-1/2" squares in the border.
The total requirement for this fat quarter quilt is four fat quarters, 2-1/4 yards of light fabric for the background fabric, 42" squares each of wadding and backing fabric, four 2-1/2" strips of border fabric. Yes, I know - the backing fabric can be made from one piece of fabric with no piecing! That was an unexpected bonus.
In fact, I used three fat quarters and then used another fabric for the fourth quarter so that I could make the binding from it as well.
The Building Blocks quilt block is a lovely quilt block. It is quite striking to look at but very easy to assemble - not a triangle in sight!
To make each Building Blocks quilt block you will need:
Dark fabric: 8 strips 6-1/2" by 2-1/2", 16 squares 2-1/2"
Light background fabric: 4 strips 6-1/2" by 2-1/2", 20 squares 2-1/2", 1 square 6-1/2"
The easiest way to make the Building Blocks quilt block is to cut 2-1/2" strips across the width of fabric and sew them together as shown: one strip of dark, light, dark fabric and one strip of light, dark, light fabric.
The strips of the fat quarters are not full length so I sewed two lengths of fat quarter fabric to one length of background fabric.
Cut eight 2-1/2" strips from the light, dark, light strip and four 2-1/2" strips from the dark, light, dark strip.
Sew three strips together as shown to make a nine patch square and then repeat the process to make three more squares.
Cut four 6-1/2" lengths of dark, light, dark fabric to make 6-1/2" strip squares.
Arrange the Building Block quilt block patches as shown, with a nine patch square in each corner, the light 6-1/2" square in the middle and the 6-1/2" strip squares between all the nine patch squares.
Sew the patchwork pieces together across each row and then sew the rows together.
Repeat with the other three fat quarters to make four 18" quilt blocks.
Sew one 18-1/2" length of 2-1/2" fabric to the right of one of the quilt blocks and then sew a second quilt block to the right of the sashing.
Sew the other two quilt blocks together with sashing in the same way.
Sew an 18-1/2" strip of sashing to either side of a 2-1/2" square of the background fabric (using the two colours that you haven't yet used in sashing). This will be the sashing joining the two pairs of quilt blocks together.
Sew this strip of sashing to the bottom of the first pair of quilt blocks taking care to match the central block with the sashing between the pair of blocks. Sew the remaining pair of quilt blocks to the bottom of the sashing.
Sew the remaining strips of the fat quarters and background fabric together in pairs and then cut these at 2-1/2" intervals to make pairs of squares. Sew the squares together to make long lines of squares for the border. I sewed these together randomly rather than in a fixed order of colours.
Sew a strip of 19 squares across the top and bottom of the quilt and a strip of 21 squares down each side. That's the fat quarter quilt top complete and you should have used up all of the fat quarters. Press carefully on wrong side and on right side.
Place the backing fabric right side down, lay the wadding on top and lay the quilt top above that.
Quilt and bind.
I quilted straight lines across both diagonals to make a cross hatch quilting pattern.
There: that’s a few of my fat quarters used up. I’m not even going to count how many still to go!
By Rose Smith, Ludlow Quilt and Sew
Happy Quilting!
Penny Halgren
Master Quilter
