Michael Miller Monday: How Charming!

Yes, I'm back and I have a VERY lavender quilt to show you. Don't confuse this with purple! But, I have to say that I have never made a lavender quilt in my 30+ years of quilting - not a one. This will go down in the history books, right? Ha ha.

Here she is. And I will share a few details of how I got here.

Charming, right?

Please remember I was sent a set of fat quarters. Let me remind you.

Charming fat quarters

I chose the four lavender skus and one of the light prints, plus a few Fairy Frost fat quarters.

The fabrics I chose to work with

I cut two 9-1/2" squares from that interesting fabric with the spider webs. I usually don't like spiders and their webs - I walked right into one last week on my morning 3 mile walk and just about had a heart attack! But this web looks sweet and harmless (yeah, right).

I was not interested in centering the motif. I like the "organic" look.

Two squares with the spider web.

After trying to listen intently to the fabrics and what they wanted to become, I set to work surrounding the squares with 1-1/2" strips of the light green.

Strips of green surround the squares

I fussy cut from another fabric, centering a bouquet of flowers. I had to use a piece of freezer paper in order to get in all straight. This is my center square and I cut it at 11-1/2" (I won't be using strips around it).

Fussy cutting my center square

I had to get creative in cutting the corner and side setting triangles. Fat quarters are not a lot of fabric!

I needed TWO 9" squares for the corner triangles. Cut those in half as you can see. This is so the outside edges are on the straight grain, NOT on the bias.

Cutting the 9" squares in half for the corner triangles

Then I forgot to take pics of the side triangles, but just so you know: to set 11" squares on point and have side setting triangles fit, I needed to cut one 17" square into four triangles. This is so that the outside edge is along the straight grain! I used one of the other prints with the beautiful roses.

Corner and side triangles

 Everything is stitched along the diagonal. Let me show you (lighting in my sewing room isn't the greatest near the design wall). Notice how the center diagonal row is made up of two corner triangles and 3 blocks. The right corner block has one side triangle (cut from a 17" square) on each side with a corner triangle as shown. The bottom left corner block has the same. Notice the two diagonal seams that are about to be stitched!

Four squares with green strips; center square plain

These side and corner triangles are cut a little large; time to trim, leaving 1/4" seam. The quilt center is about 32" x 32". Now to get ready to put the red Fairy Frost inner border on.

Trimming to leave 1/4" seam

One of the prints is composed of rows of roses. There were four of them. I cut them apart and used them in the borders. Of course, they are only 18" wide, so I had to get creative with the leftovers from cutting these blocks.

How Charming, indeed!

Some little girl will love this quilt. It measures about 40" x 40". Have you ever made a lavender quilt?

I can't wait to sew with the black and red prints. And those luscious blues. I'll keep you posted.