Log Cabin Quilt from fat quarters

So back around the beginning of May 2019, Aldi stores Australia had their sewing specials that they have every once in a while (yearly I think?) After finally finishing my sons quilt last year before Christmas, I had been thinking of making one for myself as well, and not just my giant scrap patchwork one that I am planning to make from my dressmaking scraps (as I am going to need to make a few more dresses before I'll have enough fabric for that one) I fell in love with 2 of the fat quarter bundles on offer at Aldi that week, and purchased myself 2 of each (so 4 packs of 6, equalling 24 fat quarters in total) as well as a 45mm rotary cutter and a few other bits and pieces. The designs feature florals, stripes and dots in coral, light green, light blue and light mustard yellow. Since then I have discovered the Pantone colour of the year for 2019 is "Living Coral" so it seems the choice is on trend, not that I particularly care....

I looked on pinterest to find a tutorial for a quilt block which would use most of the fabric of my fat quarters with minimal wastage. I found this tutorial for a basic log cabin block, where each fat quarter provides enough pieces for 2 blocks (excluding the centre square) and just cut up all my fabric and sewed them together randomly. I found an extra fat quarter in my stash, as well as a small scrap, that coordinated with the fabrics, to make the 48 3 inch squares I needed for the blocks. I constructed the blocks using the chain stitch method, just grabbing random pieces for the first few pieces, but when I got up to the 4th piece and above, I went through and matched each partial block with a piece to sew on, in a neat stack, to make sure I didn't end up with doubles, and to keep things a little bit neater. I didn't take any progress photos, as this was all happening late at night after my son had gone to bed, and the thought didn't really occur to me....

The blocks all went together very quickly, but then I was faced with the problem of finding the space to lay out 48 blocks to work out how I wanted the layout. Although all of the blocks are made of random pieces, some still have more lighter colour or darker colours, so I wanted to make sure they looked balanced once laid out next to each other. My house is far too cluttered to find enough space, so after completing the blocks, I sewed them together in strips of 6, then I put them aside until the next time I went to visit my brother and his wife at their lovely home they purchased earlier in the year.

At the time my older brother and his girlfriend were staying at my younger brothers house, so his girlfriend helped me to lay my strips of blocks out on the office floor, trying to find an arrangement that had none of the same prints touching. Unfortunately we couldn't manage that perfectly, but still came up with a fairly balanced, pleasing layout. At this point, I sewed the top together, and put it aside until I had the chance to go shopping for backing, wadding and binding. 

My mother helped me pick out an orange backing fabric and a perfect floral for the binding one day at spotlight, so I began laying out the backing, wadding and quilt top when I got home and cleared enough space on my dining room floor. At this point I actually decided to unpick and remove 1 row and 1 column of squares, as the blanket just looked too big compared to my single size duvet. Once I had removed those squares, it felt like the perfect size.

Once I had all the layers laid out and weighed down (with big cans of baked beans) I decided to hand baste the quilt together, instead of using safety pins, as I had pins rust in a previous project, and really did not want to risk that with this one. It was a bit of a tedious job. and my back was killing me after, but I think it was worth it to ensure I wouldn't get any rust marks damaging my beautiful quilt. 

I then did some basic free motion quilting using my Brother Innovis, removed the hand basting, then sewed on one side of the binding, using a tutorial which I cannot locate anymore, in order to achieve the nice mitred corners. Then all that was left to do was to hand sew the opposite side of the binding, which was quite enjoyable to do while sitting under the quilt watching some TV.

I took the quilt once again to my little brother's house to take completed photos, and as soon as I put it down, my son tried to help by rearranging it.

Absolutely love how it has turned out.

Admittedly, I actually finished this some weeks ago, and only just now got around to finishing writing the post. I have been using the quilt most nights, and even took it away with me this past long weekend. Again, with more help from my son..

How would I ever get anything done without his help?

I think I have been enjoying this quilting kick lately, as it is a project I can achieve in small increments, plus I don't have to face the reality of my larger post-partum body.

Any other dressmakers experimenting with quilting lately?

Dixie