Red, white and blue is one of my favorite color combos and I'm a firm believer that one can never have too many red, white and blue quilts.  I have a couple of red, white and blue flag quilts, a couple of red, white and blue star quilts, a red quilt, some blue quilts. I even have a red, white and blue Pineapple quilt.  But I didn't have a plain red, white, and blue patchwork quilt...so I set off to make one last June.

I grabbed lots of red, white and blue fabrics from my stash and decided to make a scrappy version of my Rough and Tumble pattern.  (In the original pattern, prints and solids are used in each block. But this time I decided to just use all prints.)  These blocks are simple and a little bit unique.  With a little bit of strip piecing, they go together fast!

I mixed in some chambray and a cute Americana text print to break up all of the scrappiness.

My friend, Jen Ostler in Highland, Utah quilted it for me with some wavy lines, reminiscent of a flag blowing in the wind. I love this panto for that reason and have used it several times on patriotic quilts!

If you've been following me for a while, you know I use Jen for most of my longarm quilting needs and she always hides a little object in the quilting.  Makes for a fun game of hide 'n seek.  Can you see the tiny little star in the picture above?  Jen is the best and puts so much love into each and every quilt she quilts.

One day as I was hand-stitching the binding down to the backside of this quilt, my husband saw it for the first time and said, "Oooh, I really like that quilt!" and I said, "Oh what do you like about it?"  He said he really liked the chambray and the plaid backing fabric together.  I guess it was a little more "manly" than most of the other quilts I make.  I did specifically try not to have a lot of florals in this one (I think there is just one).

I bound it in a gingham print, which I always love for binding.

I added one of my favorite labels from Ever Emblem.  They're so easy to sew into the binding so I don't have an excuse to not label my quilts!  I get the 2" cotton, fold-over, sew-in labels.  If you want to get some for yourself, you will just have to pick one of their basic cotton labels and customize it from there.

I think this is the fourth or fifth Rough and Tumble quilt I've made and it's definitely my favorite!  

Rough and Tumble comes with instructions for 5 different quilt sizes and is beginner-friendly.

My red, white, and blue version is the twin-size.  I'm excited to use it this summer for picnics, ball games and just displayed around my house.

If you'd like to grab the paper or PDF pattern, you can visit my shop HERE.

If you'd like to see my other red, white, and blue quilts you can check out THIS post.

Thanks for stopping by today!  I hope you found some inspiration here...

Friendship Star Quilt

 Hello!  In December I shared a cutting chart + instructions for the Friendship Star quilt block in 6 different sizes.  Today I want to share with you the finished quilt that prompted that post.

A few months ago in my local quilt group, we had a member who fell and broke both of her wrists.  Some of us in the group thought it would be nice to make her a quilt to show her a little extra love during that difficult time.  We decided to use the simple, classic Friendship block because of its name and we asked everyone who wanted to participate to make 1 block in her favorite colors - pink and yellow.  Here it is all finished!

We made the 12" blocks from my cutting chart and got a total of 20 blocks.

So the finished quilt size is 48" x 60 - a nice lap-size quilt.

 This is a "friendship quilt" in the truest sense of the word.  Many friends made blocks.

I sewed them all together to make the quilt top. One friend named Grace quilted it and another friend named Melissa bound it.  It was a true joint effort!

I think the different shades of pink and yellow ended up so cute and using different low-volume fabrics for the block backgrounds was a scrappy, yet cohesive way to pull everything together!

I had this swallow print in my stash that I thought went perfectly with the front of the quilt.

It's from my first fabric collection, Treasured Threads.

What do you think?  Fun project right?  It's so nice to come together as friends/quilting community to do some good sometimes!  If you want the cutting chart and instructions click HERE.  It includes instructions for 6 different block sizes.  

Thanks for stopping by today.

Merry Pinwheels Baby Quilt

 Hi there!  Today I want to share a baby quilt that I actually finished a couple of months ago.

The pattern is called Merry Pinwheels and this is the second Merry Pinwheels quilt I've made.  If you're curious, you can check out the original one HERE.

 I made this because I really wanted to see what this pattern looked like in non-Christmasy colors! 

Plus, I thought a pinwheel quilt would be so cute for a baby.

I based the color scheme on the sweet yellow, pink, and copper-brown ditzy floral print in the middle row above. I just love that print and thought it would make for a unique color palette for a baby girl quilt.

I tried to use a nice variety of prints including florals, plaids, checks, stripes, and geometrics.

I had everything in my stash for this quilt except the binding fabric. I love it when I get to make a quilt predominantly out of my stash.  Feels so good to use up what I have!

I inherited this pink stripe fabric from my grandmother after she passed away.

I love incorporating pieces of her fabrics into my quilts!

This copper-brown floral fabric is a favorite. And the yellow background fabric is 

from my first fabric collection, Treasured Threads.

The quilting was done by Jen Ostler in Highland, Utah.  She is awesome.

Jen used one of my favorite, go-to pantos called Interlocking Orange Peel by Karlee Porter Designs.

When I was making the quilt top, it was a little tricky to spread out similar colors and prints to achieve balance.  But I just kept moving the blocks around until I found a layout I was happy with.

I really enjoyed working with this color palette and all of the sweet prints.

Merry Pinwheels is perfect for confident beginners and comes with instructions for 5 different-size quilts. You can use your stash (like I did here) or 2-1/2" x 40" wide precut strips.  It's very versatile!

You can grab the Merry Pinwheels pdf pattern HERE or the paper pattern HERE.

I'd love to hear what you think about this baby quilt version of Merry Pinwheels!

Thanks for stopping by today and happy quilting!

Cherish - A Gigi's Thimble Quilt Pattern

Hello friends!  Today I want to introduce to you my new quilt pattern, Cherish.

It's a scrap-friendly pattern that features lots of patchwork hearts and a scalloped border.

There are 3 size options included: lap, throw, and full.

This was my original fabric pull - all from my stash.

The pattern is perfect for using your stash, scraps, or precuts.  

I love simple patchwork; these hearts are so fun to make.

 I would describe the skill level for this pattern as advanced beginner/intermediate.

The hearts are rather simple and surprisingly, the appliqued border is too.

The scallop is a very simple shape that doesn't have points so this is a great pattern to learn the art of applique.  For reference, each scallop took me about 7 minutes to applique. My pattern includes lots of diagrams and tips so I definitely want to encourage you to give it a try if you have never appliqued before.  BUT, if applique isn't your thing, you can totally leave off the scalloped border!  I think it would be just as cute and I plan to make another version soon (without the scalloped border) to show you!

Edit: HERE is the link to the alternate version!

Note: If you want to omit the scalloped border, I would just do the cream inner border and then call it quits. So don't buy the red scalloped border fabric.  And only buy 2-3/4 yards of cream background fabric for the lap-size quilt, 4-1/2 yards for the throw-size quilt, and 5-1/4 yards for the full-size quilt.

I thought this quilt would be beautiful with some custom quilting (mostly because of the scalloped border) so I took it to my friend Linda Childs in Alpine, Utah.

I asked her to do dense crosshatching in the center of the quilt and I am in LOVE!!!

I left her to do whatever she wanted on the borders and I think the design she came up with really enhanced the scallops and feel of this quilt!

I love the red and white plaid binding that was already printed on the bias.  And the pink floral print on the back really gives it that Valentine's Day feel!  The labels are from Ever Emblem.  I've been getting them for years and love them.  So convenient and easy to attach!  I get the 2" cotton, fold-over, sew-in labels.  You'll have to choose a label and customize it from there.  

This was a really fun quilt to make.  If you want to snag a Cherish pattern for yourself, you can grab the paper pattern HERE or the PDF pattern HERE.

Let me know if you have any questions about Cherish or just what you think about this new pattern of mine.  Thank you for stopping by today and happy quilting!

Scrappy Snow Village Quilt

 I'm happy to finally be sharing my scrappy Snow Village quilt today!

Be prepared for lots of photos!

The timeline for this project was:

I started this project last January, made most of the house blocks at a Christmas in July party last summer, finished the quilt top at a retreat I went to in August, and finally bound it (and added the rest of the embellishments) in December.

The original Snow Village pattern is really simple so I thought it would be nice to add a little pizazz to the blocks with some embellishments!  The above block was my first one.  I love wreaths in windows at Christmastime so I embroidered some onto cream wool and then top stitched them onto the house to create windows.  The little pom poms reminded me of Christmas lights!

I found some brick-print fabric online, which I thought would be great for chimneys (check out the bottom of this post for a tutorial on how to add those).  And the fussy-cut Santa in a window was an easy embellishment.  This was such a fun project to just let loose on and be creative!

This house block (above - middle) is probably my favorite block.  I love the floral trim that someone brought to our Christmas in July party.  I used it at the bottom of some gray wool "windows" that I quilted diagonal grids on so that they looked like flower boxes.  Then I cut out a green wool circle with my pinking shears and sewed it to the front door so it looked like a wreath!

Linda Childs quilted it for me.  She is a longarm quilter based in Alpine, Utah.  I go to her whenever I need custom quilting and she always does an amazing job!  

I don't usually like surprises when it comes to longarm quilting but this time I told Linda to just "go to town" and have fun with the quilting.  I trusted her and didn't need or want anything particular.  She quilted each house block differently and each snowflake block with the same motif.  The sashing and border feature a variety of different snowflakes.  It's perfect!

I love looking around and finding new favorite details on the house blocks.  

I added the button "doorknobs" after it was quilted.

Can you see the black "smoke" I added to the chimney here (above)?  I added a piece of sashing to the block and then free-handed the smoke with my sewing machine.  I only did that on 3 blocks.

I added one of the super handy quilt labels I get from Everemblem to the back of the quilt.  I get the 2" cotton, fold-over, sew-in labels. If you go to their site, you'll have to pick a cotton label and customize it from there.  I've loved the ease of these labels.  It's time for me to get some new ones for 2024.

This quilt was so fun to make!  I have a lot of joy thinking of the memories I made with my quilt group as we worked on these together at our awesome Christmas in July party.  I also love looking at all the details on this quilt.  It's not very often that you want to inspect every square inch of a quilt to see the fun fabrics and quilting!

And finally, here's a quick little demo if you want to add chimneys to a scrappy Snow Village quilt.  These are so easy; they're just top stitched on (raw-edge applique!)

First, cut out a 1-1/2" x 3" rectangle for the chimney.  Take a square that will be used for the background corner of the roof unit and fold it in half diagonally to create a crease that will indicate your stitching line.  Place the chimney rectangle on the background square leaving 1/2" of space at the top.  You can move the rectangle right or left just make sure the bottom-right corner of the rectangle covers the crease by at least 1/4" as shown.

Pin and top-stitch the rectangle in place.  You don't need to top stitch the bottom of the rectangle as that will be sewn into the seam allowance when you attach this square to create the roof.  Trim the threads.

After you've top-stitched the chimney in place, place the square on one end of the roof rectangle.  Make sure the chimney will be lying in the correct position once it's sewn on.  Trim and press the seam allowances toward the roof.

That's it!  Easy peasy!

You can grab the Snow Village paper pattern, HERE.  

Or, the PDF pattern, HERE.

Click HERE to read all about the Christmas in July Party! 

Have you added embellishments to a quilt before?  I'd love to hear what you think about this project.

Thanks for stopping by!